Cultural heritage tourism increasingly aims to provide not only recreation but also cultural learning, identity formation, and immersive engagement. This study examines how cultural memory, place attachment, and Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) constructs jointly relate to visitors' experiences and design-oriented insights at Sanhe Ancient Town, China. We develop and empirically examine a Cultural-Affective-Behavioral Intention model that links three cultural-memory pathways to place attachment, TPB components, and an overall cultural heritage tourism experience index. Cross-sectional survey data from 420 on-site visitors were analysed using structural equation modelling and exploratory Random Forest analysis. SEM results indicate that symbolic and narrative pathways are positively associated with place attachment, which in turn is positively associated with TPB constructs and behavioural intention and shows a positive association with higher levels of self-reported tourism experience, whereas the ritual pathway does not exhibit a significant linear effect on attachment. Random Forest analyses further highlight the central roles of behavioural intention, place attachment, and narrative cues while suggesting additional, nonlinear contributions of ritual elements. Taken together, the findings highlight cultural memory and place attachment as core mechanisms for shaping meaningful, sustainability-oriented heritage experiences and offer theory-informed implications for visual and narrative strategies at heritage destinations.
QIAN et al. (Tue,) studied this question.
Synapse has enriched 5 closely related papers on similar clinical questions. Consider them for comparative context: