The Influence of Tourists' Characteristics on Ratings of Information Sources for an Attraction

Information sources about a product or service potentially affect a tourist's purchase decision. The characteristics of tourists influence the manner in which they search for, rate, and use information about tourism related products or services. The purpose of this paper is to determine the relationship between the characteristics of visitors to an attraction and information source importance ratings. It concludes that word-of-mouth information is rated most important, followed by past experience and other media sources. Additionally, several demographic and trip characteristics are related to rating of information sources, as are visitor motives.