Effects of Distance and First-Time Visitation on Tourists’ Length of Stay

Abstract

The analysis of length of stay and its determinants remains important in tourism due to

Distance matters: the impact of physical and relative distance on pleasure tourists' length of stay in Barbados

“…In this study, we follow recent developments in the literature and use count data models (Alén, Nicolau, Losada, & Domínguez, 2014;Nicolau, Zach, & Tussyadiah, 2018;Prebensen, Altin, & Uysal, 2015;Rodríguez, Martínez-Roget, & Gonzalez-Murias, 2018;Salmasi, Celidoni, & Procidano, 2012). Our choice of count data models is related to the particularities of the length of stay variable, which is measured as the number of days or overnight stays making it a discrete and strictly positive integer variable (Rodríguez, Martínez-Roget, & Gonzalez-Murias, 2018).…”

“…The impact of distance has also been considered. However, studies on length of stay generally focus on the impact of physical distance on length of stay (Nicolau, Zach, & Tussyadiah, 2018). This study contributes to the literature by moving beyond the notion of distance in a physical and avers that distance is a complex multidimensional construct.…”

“…To date, length of stay has been linked to a variety of variables, such as age (Alegre, Mateo, & Pou, 2011;Alén, Nicolau, Losada, & Domínguez, 2014), gender (Mortazavi & Cialani, 2017;Santos, Ramos, & Rey-Maquieira, 2015), employment status (Wang, Little, DelHomme-Little, & Ann, 2012;Salmasi, Celidoni, & Procidano, 2012), accommodation form (Alegre & Pou, 2006;Mortazavi & Cialani, 2017;Martinez-Garcia & Ma Raya, 2008), nationality (Gokovali, Bahar, & Kozak, 2007;Thrane & Farstad, 2012), travel purpose (Alén, Nicolau, Losada, & Domínguez, 2014), travel cost (Peypoch, Randriamboarison, Rasoamananjara, & Solonandrasana, 2012), means of transportation (Santos, Ramos, & Rey-Maquieira, 2015), travel party size (Gómez-Déniz & Pérez-Rodríguez, 2019) and travel motivation (Alegre & Pou, 2006). Notwithstanding the myriad of factors assumed to influence length of stay, distance is considered one of the most essential variables (Nicolau, Zach, & Tussyadiah, 2018).…”

“…As such, greater utility can be gained by balancing the proportion of fixed costs and varied cost: the greater fixed costs associated with longer travel will encourage the traveller to increase the varied costs incurred by length of stay. Indeed, several works provide evidence of a positive relationship between geographic distance and trip duration (Blaine, Mohammad, & Var, 1993;Mak, Moncur, & Yonamine, 1977;Nicolau et al, 2018;Walsh & Davitt, 1983;E. Wang, Little, & DelHomme-Little, 2012).…”

“…The length of stay represents the "quantity of holiday" bought by the tourist (Mak & Moncur, 1979), which in turn is directly related to tourism incomes (Wang, Fong, Law, & Fang, 2018). Length of stay also has an impact on tourists' activities and behaviour as well as the intensity of interactions with locals, which in turn impacts satisfaction, attitudes towards and destination attributes (Nicolau, Zach, & Tussyadiah, 2018) . Understanding the determinants of tourists' length of stay is thus an important economic concern and paramount for effective planning and management in tourism (Martinez-Garcia & Ma Raya, 2008) Previous studies on length of stay suggests that visit duration is related to variables such as tourist profile, trip characteristics and destination attributes (Gössling, Scott, & Michael, 2018).…”