CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
- Background of the study
The World Tourism Organisation defines tourism as “the activities of persons traveling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes.” This broad definition of tourism is then broken down into six categories according to the purpose of the trip: Leisure, recreation and holidays; Visiting friends and relatives: Business and professional activities; Health treatment; Religious and pilgrimages. Those that engage in tourism – i.e. tourists can also be divided into international tourists and domestic tourists and into overnight tourists and same-day visitors. The individual tourist is believed to be influenced by the social, cultural or nationality groups that they belong to. Thus the collective value, taste, lifestyle, and characteristics of social, national or cultural groups are interpreted as instrumental in moulding individual tourist’s behaviour and taste in some structured manner. (Butler, 1991); and (Holloway and Plant, 1998), suggests that there is a strong tendency for individuals to conform to the norms and values of social groups (peers, students, workmates, friends, neighbors and relations) cultural, national or regional groups in their aggregate patterns of demand for tourism products. Also, tourists’ habits and participation pattern is a function of available resources; that is destination product supply tends to influence tourist’s pattern.
