PNA-TX: A Checklist to Evaluate Tourist eXperience in Protected Natural Areas

Protected Natural Areas (PNAs) face a structural challenge in Tourist eXperience (TX) management: existing TX evaluation instruments were developed mainly for controlled commercial environments and do not account for the ecological variability, diverse visitor profiles, and dual conservation-recreation mandate that characterize these spaces. This article presents the development and appraisal of the PNAs TX Checklist (PNA-TX), a 41-item instrument designed to evaluate tourist experience quality in protected natural areas across six dimensions: Sensory, Emotional, Cognitive, Practical, Relational, and Sustainability. The instrument was developed following Stufflebeam’s Checklist Development Checklist (CDC) methodology, grounded in a systematic review of TX literature. It was appraisal through an initial review by three Tourism Administration students, followed by two sequential rounds of expert appraisal involving eight and nine practitioners, respectively, from Chilean national parks and private conservation reserves; the perceived usefulness of PNA-TX was also assessed with tourists of varied cultural backgrounds. This appraisal process indicates that the PNA-TX showed evidence of applicability, usefulness, and feasibility within the Chilean protected-area contexts examined by experts, complemented by preliminary evidence of perceived usefulness across a culturally diverse tourist sample. The PNA-TX addresses a gap in the literature by combining field-observable management conditions with experiential quality indicators specifically calibrated for the protected natural area context. It also supports sustainability-oriented management practices aligned with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 11, 13, and 15.