Residents’ perceptions on tourism impacts in a world heritage site

What is it about?

A cluster analysis was used to separate Guimarães (Portugal) residents into clusters according to their perceptions of the impacts of tourism development. The clustering procedure analysed 400 data observations from a Guimaraes resident survey and revealed the existence of three clusters: the Sceptics, the Moderately Optimistic and the Enthusiasts. The fact that tourism is relatively recent in this destination has its major reflex in the devaluation by most of the residents of the negative impacts of tourism development.

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Why is it important?

This approach is uncommonly applied to Portugal data and is even rarer for world heritage sites. The world heritage designation is believed to make an area more attractive to tourists. The results were consistent with the empirical literature’s results, with the emergent nature of the destination found to be relevant.