Motivations and Loyalty of the Demand for Adventure Tourism as Sustainable Travel

Mauricio Carvache-Franco, Daniel Contreras-Moscol, Miguel Orden-Mejía, Wilmer Carvache-Franco, Héctor Vera-Holguin and Orly Carvache-Franco
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Mauricio Carvache-Franco: Facultad de Turismo y Hotelería, Universidad Espíritu Santo, Samborondón 092301, Ecuador
Daniel Contreras-Moscol: Centro de Emprendimiento e Innovación I3Lab, Escuela Superior Politécnica del Litoral, ESPOL, Guayaquil 090903, Ecuador
Miguel Orden-Mejía: Facultat de Turisme i Geografia, Universitat Rovira i Virgili, 43480 Vila-seca, Spain
Wilmer Carvache-Franco: Facultad de Ciencias Sociales y Humanísticas, Escuela Superior Politécnica del Litoral, ESPOL, Guayaquil 090903, Ecuador
Héctor Vera-Holguin: Facultad de Ciencias Sociales y Humanísticas, Escuela Superior Politécnica del Litoral, ESPOL, Guayaquil 090903, Ecuador
Orly Carvache-Franco: Facultad de Ciencias Económicas, Administrativas y Empresariales, Universidad Católica de Santiago de Guayaquil, Guayaquil 090615, Ecuador

Sustainability, 2022, vol. 14, issue 14, 1-17

Abstract: Adventure tourism as a form of sustainable tourism is a potential source of social, economic, and environmental development, and the more the tourism industry is exploited in a responsible manner, the greater the development of a country. The present research proposes the following objectives: (i) to identify the motivational dimensions of demand in an adventure destination, and (ii) to determine the motivational dimensions of demand that predict the return, recommendation, and saying positive things of the adventure destination as loyalty variables. The study was carried out during the COVID-19 pandemic in Guayaquil, and the participants had visited the province of Santa Elena in Ecuador, an adventure tourism destination. This quantitative study used a sample of 318 valid questionnaires that were collected online and analyzed using factor analysis and the multiple regression enter method. The results show five motivational dimensions in adventure tourism: learning, social, biosecurity, relaxation, and competence mastery. The relaxation dimension is the most important and most influential predictor in return, recommendation, and saying positive things about the demand for adventure tourism. The results will contribute as management guides for DMOs and as sources of information for companies involved in the marketing and development of post-pandemic products. The study is also a contribution to the academic literature on adventure destinations.

Keywords: post-pandemic; COVID-19; motivation; loyalty; adventure; sustainable (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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