1. Introduction
World Heritage Sites (WHS) are rare and irreplaceable treasures classified by UNESCO and the World Heritage Committee. They are masterpieces of nature and humanity with an Outstanding Universal Value (OUV) recognized by all mankind [1], and have significant aesthetic, scientific and heritage values, following the principles of conservation first and heritage exploitation second; thus, they have become a valuable vehicle for mass tourism, scientific research and value transmission [2,3]. A WHS is characterized by scarcity, non-renewability, irreplaceability, and the need for long-term protection; thus, heritage conservation is the basic premise and core issue of heritage tourism [4]. At the same time, WHS are also iconic tourist destinations and regional economic development hotspots, with heritage tourism becoming one of the most important and fastest growing segments of the tourist industry [5,6,7,8]. In particular, tourism communities in and around heritage sites, where heritage tourism is the primary economic source, rely on the branding effect of WHS and are actively developing the tourist industry as the chief source of livelihood for local communities [9,10,11]. To some extent, regarding WHS as local “money spinners” may put enormous pressure on the conservation of heritage sites and even threaten their sustainability [12]. Whether a WHS is as a panacea or a placebo for tourist development has been a hot topic of controversial research over the past few decades, and no conclusion has been reached [4,13].
For research related to WHS, scholars have focused on various phenomena occurring in WHS and possible connected issues from the perspectives of heritage conservation, heritage values, heritage management, tourist development, visitor perception, place attachment, community participation, community livelihoods, and sustainable development of WHS [2,3,4,10,12,14,15,16,17,18,19,20,21]. As one of the key stakeholders of WHS, tourist communities of heritage sites are most sensitive to the broader impacts that WHS bring, while having a sense of home, local sentiment, livelihood, social capital and cultural capital for the heritage sites and their in-depth perception and satisfaction rating are crucial for heritage preservation, value transmission and sustainable development [19,21,22,23,24]. Local residents are the hosts of tourism communities in WHS, and they have the greatest interest in the tourist industry and socio-economic development of heritage areas, which concern their community livelihoods, social ethos, cultural practices, ecological environment, and heritage conservation and management [4,19,20,22]. Meanwhile, tourism has been described as a destroyer of culture, undermining social norms and economies, destroying the social fabric and depriving communities of individuality. On the other hand, tourism development acts as a rescuer of the poor and disadvantaged, providing opportunities and economic benefits, facilitating social exchange, and improving livelihoods [25,26]. Just like the two sides of the coin, the branding effect of WHS has brought about great economic development of tourism in the region, boosting the economic income of the communities, providing employment opportunities, improving the infrastructure, enhancing the pride of home and gaining external exchange opportunities, while at the same time leading to some extent to negative impacts such as rising prices, ecological pressure, environmental pollution, broadening the disparity between rich and poor, destruction of heritage and loss of traditions [14,27,28]. The emergence and resolution of these issues is crucial to the conservation and transmission of the OUV of WHS, especially the research on the quality of life (QOL), community satisfaction and perceived benefits and costs of heritage tourist development in communities, which contributes to the conservation of WHS and the sustainable development of the tourism industry [2,11,19,29].
As of July 2021, the total number of WHS has reached 1122 projects, scattered in 167 countries. China is a developing country with 56 World Heritage Sites and, along with Italy, has the largest number of World Heritage items. Just as Caust and Vecco (2017) say, it is a blessing and a burden to be listed as a WHS in a developing country in Asia [15]. In recent years, heritage tourism in China has grown rapidly and China’s WHS have become almost the golden benchmark for destination development, receiving widespread attention from government agencies, the tourism industry, academia, tourists and the heritage communities. Especially for the residents of WHS tourist communities who are the hosts, the great development of tourism in heritage sites is about the benefits to the communities and the associated costs to them [2,15,19,22,23,24]. For example, after the successful application for WHS in 2008, the tourist industry in Mountain Sanqingshan National Park (MSNP) has grown rapidly, with the number of tourists soaring from 1.48 million in 2008 to 23.95 million in 2019. This undoubtedly puts great pressure on the conservation and management and sustainability of WHS. Generally speaking, the ecological environments in the World Natural Heritage Sites are fragile and vulnerable to environmental pollution and ecosystem destruction. The World Heritage Sites in China often face issues such as uncontrolled tourist capacity, overdevelopment of tourist facilities, over-commercialization and adverse impacts, which pose major challenges to conservation management and sustainable development of WHS [4,30,31]. China’s top World Heritage tourist destinations, due to the brand effect of WHS and the development of the tourism economy, promote construction of regional cultural and tourist infrastructure, upgrade basic transportation, improve community landscape, and enhance economic benefits [4,32,33]. Meanwhile, the tourist development in WHS provides a good impetus for community livelihoods and heritage conservation, which together with the favorable conditions such as social capital and place attachment possessed by the residents of the heritage communities themselves, also contribute to heritage conservation to a certain extent [2,18,30,34]. On the other hand, the development of the tourist industry can put stress on the physical, natural and cultural environment and on the lives of the inhabitants. In many cases, the development of tourism in WHS could undermine the economic status, social support and psychological well-being of the inhabitants, and this negative impact can undoubtedly lead to dissatisfaction and weakened support for tourism development, to the detriment of heritage conservation and sustainable development [4,8,13]. Do heritage tourism communities actively prop up the development of heritage tourism and enthusiastically embrace the historical development opportunities in their hometowns, or are they disturbed by the hustle and bustle of tourism activities and resent the noisy arena of heritage tourism? What is the perceived impact of tourists on the inhabitants of heritage tourism communities, who are naturally attached to their places and even their communities? What is their satisfaction with tourist development and life? What role do their local and community attachments play? These questions and reflections are the starting points and aims of this study.
This research examines the influence of tourist development on the benefits and costs of tourist communities in MSNP, as well as the place attachment of local residents, to explore the satisfaction of tourism community life and tourist development in heritage regions. This conceptual framework includes the perceived costs and benefits of tourist community participation, place attachment, and community satisfaction. In the next sections, the literature review, hypotheses and the theoretical framework are presented. This is followed by the survey development, data collection and testing. Finally, the consequences are examined, conclusions are drawn, and proposals and implications are discussed.
2. Literature Review and Theoretical Framework
2.1. Community Participation
The word ‘community’ is derived from the Latin word for something in common and a close partnership, which first appeared in the 1887 work of the German sociologist Ferdinand Tennis, who pointed out that a group of people is established through blood, neighbors and friends. Community participation as a fundamental expression of the spirit of self-government in Western democratic societies is closely integrated with citizen participation [35]. With the emphasis on sustainable tourism and community development, research on community engagement in tourist destinations has taken off in the West. Tourist community participation means that in the process of tourist development, such as decision-making, planning, management and supervision, the opinions and needs of the community are fully considered, and they are treated as the main body of development and participation [36,37]. Community participation is gradually becoming a concept in tourism planning and is receiving increasing attention, especially when Murphy first introduced the community approach to tourism research in 1985 [38]. Community involvement in the procedure of tourist growth enhances the sense of community belonging and attachment, effectively eases the conflicts that result from tourist sites, better defends the ecology and social-cultural traditions of the areas, and advances healthy development of tourist destinations [39,40]. The positive results of community involvement have been demonstrated in many studies, including short-term benefits such as resource mobilization in response to crises [41], and long-term benefits, such as breaking down inequalities [42], establishing long-term sustainable development goals [14,43]. Community participation in tourist research is progressing along with the study on sustainable tourism development, and related studies emphasize sustainable tourism development through resident participation [44]. Tosun (2006) studied the framework of the hierarchical model of public participation in tourism planning and classified participation into spontaneous, induced and coercive participation [37], and communities are classified into tourist saturated, realized, and hungry communities according to their dependence on the tourist economy [42]. Furthermore, there are related issues of community participation, such as the low level of participation, poor access to participation, relatively low perceived benefits of participation, and insufficient economic, psychological, social, and political empowerment of community participation [45,46,47,48,49].The proactive participation of community residents is an intrinsic motivation for community tourist development, and community participation can achieve the integration of community values and also become a new driving force and growth point for local communities [50,51].
Especially in the procedure of tourist development in tourist communities in WHS, community participation can protect World Heritage Sites and the OUV, and promote comprehensive benefits of local society, economy and culture [14,20,52]. Related scholars have explored the relationship between tourist development and local community influences in WHS, revealing that inscription on the WHS list can effectively promote local tourist community participation, and that overall tourism development has a positive economic and socio-cultural impact on local communities, while local community residents also perceive some negative ecological effects of tourism development [4,31,46,53]. The impact of community tourism development in WHS is comprehensive, including which factors have an impact on the subjective well-being, especially in terms of the satisfaction of tourism communities in heritage areas, which is verified in four main dimensions: economic, social, cultural and environmental perceptions on community satisfaction [10,21]. As the research on community participation has intensified, scholars have adopted social carrying capacity theory, emotional solidarity theory, social exchange theory (SET), and other conceptual frameworks to conduct methodical studies [41,54]. Among them, the SET has been more widely used, according to which the higher the benefits received by the community, the greater the support received for community participation, which can further promote community participation, satisfaction and support of the local community, and can better explain the role of the relationship between the degree of community participation, willingness to participate, and perceived costs and benefits of participation in tourism activities [41,55,56]. Sues (2018) argued that community satisfaction contributes to community well-being and improves QOL [57]. Studying environmentally responsible behavior from destination social responsibility perspective, positive behavior generates a perception of beneficial impacts and negatively yields a perception of cost impact [58]. Based on the owned social capital, research shows that positive socioeconomic impacts, positive ecological influences, negative ecological effects, and perceived community satisfaction ultimately have some implications for supporting tourism development [36]. Related scholars have explored community dwellers’ perceived significance of tourist development, satisfaction with life areas (material/non-material), and the overall QOL in their communities to rightly understand locals’ supportive attitudes toward tourist development [59,60]. It can be said that community participation is vital in the practice of tourist development, especially when it comes to the development of tourist industries in WHS and the conservation, management and sustainability of WHS.
2.2. Perceived Cost–Benefit
The perception of tourist destination residents is the “barometer” of tourist development, which is related to the operation of the current tourist market, and also provides the theoretical basis for the government to formulate tourism policies, and the construction of a harmonious social order in the tourist region [61,62]. While tourism development can bring positive social, economic and natural impacts to local communities, the negative consequences of tourism development inevitably exist alongside the positive influences [47,63,64,65]. Since the community residents are not a completely homogeneous group, different residents may hold a variety of attitudes toward tourist development. Doxey’s “Irritability Index” model is considered to be one of the most classic frameworks to reflect the different attitudes of community inhabitants toward tourist development, suggesting inhabitants’ attitudes may go through five successive stages: intoxication, indifference, irritation, confrontation, and follow-up [66]. There is some variation in the perceived benefits and costs of tourism community participation, which is closely linked to the different attitudes generated by tourism development [14,25]. The benefits of tourist community participation refer to economic income, job opportunities, vocational skills training, decision making and management in tourist industry development [53,67,68]. According to the SET, the increased benefits of tourist community participation could change or promote the attitudes of participants, such as improving tourism community participation awareness and crisis response attitudes. Meanwhile, the higher the benefits received, and the greater the support, which further promotes the community participation motivation and improves satisfaction and well-being [41,48,69,70]. The perceived impacts of community involvement include mainly economic [39,50], social [50,68,71] and environmental [50,72,73] impacts, and are generally analyzed from the perspectives of positive–negative perceptions, and perceived costs–benefits. Residents’ satisfaction with their community and support for tourism development, their power and trust in government, and personal benefits of tourism are factors that significantly influence their attitudes toward the tourism industry [74,75]. Resident–visitor value co-creation and social interactions also impact the perceptions and satisfaction of community residents, showing that positive perceptions of tourist development encourage inhabitants to engage in value co-creation with visitors, and that life satisfaction positively impacts resident–visitor value co-creation, and the attitude of the residents and the level of development of the destination are closely correlated [21,56,76]. The findings suggest that residents’ support for tourist development is influenced by positive perceptions and that the personal benefits of tourism greatly influence residents’ judgments about the positive–negative impacts of tourism [26,75,77]. The theoretical explanation of residents’ perceptions of tourism impact mainly comes from SET, especially the exchange rules and norms, and exchanged resources and emerged exchange relations become the focus of topic [32,65,69,74,77,78,79].
Research on residents’ perceptions of influence in tourist communities has gained much attention, mainly focusing on the content and dimensions of residents’ perceptions, and their evaluation indicators, as well as relevant testing models and tourism influence attitude categories [26,80]. The TIAS (Tourism Impact Attitude Scale) has been established, which is a scale primarily applied to standardize the measurement of residents’ attitudes toward tourist development and contains local tourist development concerns and personal and community interests [81]. Ap and Crompton (1998) created a tourist impact assessment scale including economic, socio-cultural, environmental, congestion, services, taxes, and community attitudes [63]. The perceived aspects of tourism community residents are mainly related to the perceived impacts of the tourism economy, and socio-cultural and ecological environments [39,82,83]. In general, benefit–cost perception plays a positive–negative significant role in sustainable tourist development, respectively [9,45,84]. Place attachment, community attachment, and community involvement have a positive impact on perceptions of benefit and community satisfaction [45,77,85,86]. Perdue (1990) proposed a social exchange model in which residents provide resources for tourism development in order to receive what they view as equivalent benefits, with the individual interests of local community residents being the key factor influencing their perceptions and attitudes [87]. As with the “tourism dependency” hypothesis, the larger the perception of negative tourist effects, the more passive the attitude of the residents of the community, and vice versa [39,42,50,75]. Research has shown that heritage tourism can improve the QOL and satisfaction of local communities in WHS, while different types of tourism areas have varying tourism community characteristics, such as the nature of the site, level of economic development, dependence on tourism, ownership of tourism resources, tourism management system, and cultural differences between hosts and visitors, which induce differences in the perceptions of tourism community residents in WHS [25,31,45,47,77,80]. Community residents’ perceptions and attitudes toward tourism impacts change dynamically over the course of tourism development: with time, community residents’ perceptions of positive impacts of tourism development have maintained a high level of approval, while the level of perceptions of negative impacts of tourism development has increased significantly [88,89]. Although the majority of residents are still supportive of tourist development, conflicts over the distribution of benefits, reduced profitability caused by the aging of products, new profit-making opportunities brought about by the development of the local economy, and increased competition in the market have affected the enthusiasm of residents to participate in tourism, resulting in a large gap between the “will-act” [74,80,84,90]. Olya (2018) uses SET to study the different opinions from neighborhood groups supporting sustainable tourist development in WHS, and assesses the impacts of community attachment, community engagement, perceived benefits and costs; the results show that the role of perceived costs is not significant and the influences of community attachment and involvement vary across community groups [25]. Heritage tourism could enable communities to experience economic benefits in the form of increased employment opportunities and income, as well as the cultural and social benefits they may experience, such as enhanced social capital and a deeper sense of place attachment and pride in the heritage sites [14,25]. Meanwhile, the factors influencing community involvement in heritage protection and tourist development in WHS include different levels of community participation and diverse understandings of community participation in tourism, especially the effects of participation motivation, opportunities and capacity (MOA) [14].
2.3. Place Attachment
In the past half century, humanistic geographers represented by Yifu Tuan have reintroduced “place” into human geography research, and the sense of place has become an important philosophical thinking [91]. Sense of place, the association between human emotions and the physical setting, is extensively used in the fields of human geography, sociology, psychology and tourism, and is considered to be one of the factors that influence human behavior [92,93]. The “place” is not a mere spatial concept, but a social construct that is given specific values and meanings by individuals and society, and “place attachment” arises when individuals give specific meanings to places and form a positive emotional connection in the “person–place” interaction [94]. In short, place attachment, as a symbol of a “person–place” relationship, induces a sense of security, builds self-esteem and self-awareness, and forms a bond with culture, experience, and group identity. Williams et al. (1992) proposed a theoretical framework of place attachment, pointing out that place attachment contains place identity and dependence and place dependence is a functional attachment, while place identity is an affective attachment between people and places, and a place attachment gauge was proposed to estimate the emotional connection [95]. People tend to have intense attachments to places that generate strong feelings, which can shape people’s lifestyles and attitudes. People with deep place attachments tend to love the place profoundly and actively participate in community building. Lewick et al. (2008) further examined the conceptual model of place attachment and its role in community emotions, and other aspects [96]. Community attachment, as a type of place attachment, is a multifaceted psychological procedure that refers to the degree and manner of residents’ social involvement and integration into the community, reflecting the community residents’ origins and sense of belonging to community as an attitudinal construct consisting of emotional, cognitive, and behavioral intentions [97]. Community attachment has an important emotional functional role for community engagement, community support, and crisis response [73,98]. Responding to the suggestion of integrating SET, local attachment and community attachment more rationally elucidate the formative mechanisms that support tourism development [25]. Local residents’ place attachment is measured by whether it is a desirable and satisfying place to live, having much in common with feelings that they fit into the community, influenced by length of residence, personal well-being or QOL, which is linked to the intensity of established blood ties, friendships and networks of acquaintances, including affection towards their hometown, alienation regret and interest in the community [99,100]. The place attachment of tourist communities promotes the participation in tourist development, enhances the conservation of native tourist resources, and maintains the initiative of local culture [9,55]. On the other hand, the local attachment of residents is conducive to resolving conflicts formed in the course of tourist development, to the active response to unexpected crisis events, and plays a key role in decreasing the loss of life and property, safeguarding native culture and customs, ecological environment and community participation [56,101].
Based on the perspective of listed WHS and conservation, it has been shown that a nomination has a great impact on place identity, place attachment, natural environment and socio-cultural perception of the residents in the tourist communities, and it can be said that the brand of WHS has enhanced the residents’ sense of place and raised the expectation and support for the development of local tourism [102]. From the view of place attachment and utilizing WHS as case sites, Tang et al. (2008) show that place attachment enhances community residents’ perceptions of heritage values and the perceived social responsibilities that tourism enterprises should shoulder, as well as heritage tourism community residents’ expressions of the relevant responsibilities that major tourist development stakeholders should undertake, especially for the ecological environment and local communities [93]. Based on sense of place and expectation theory, Xu et al. (2009) used a core community of tourism in WHS as an example, and found that there were differences in the perceived effect of community residents’ sense of place on tourist development, indicating that perceptions of benefits promoted supportive attitudes toward local tourism development, while perceptions of cost did the opposite [55]. Gannon et al. (2020) used SET to examine whether place attachment, environmental–cultural attitudes, economic gains, and community engagement directly impact residents’ support for tourist development or whether their effects are mediated by perceived tourist influences [103]. Social determinants were stronger in explaining the place attachment factors of residents and visitors, and they accounted for a greater extent of the factors influencing place attachment for community residents [59,80]. Residents’ level of place attachment influences their perceived impact and attitudes, and related studies have found that locals with high levels of place attachment tend to support tourism development and experience higher satisfaction with community life, while place attachment more strongly influences residents’ word of mouth and participation in destination tourist planning, as well as their overall behavioral intentions toward community tourist development [73,104,105,106].
2.4. Community Satisfaction
Satisfaction is a psychological state; if someone’s actual feeling meets or exceeds expectations, they will feel satisfied, and vice versa [59]. The core elements of satisfaction formation include relationships, give-reward-expectations, and perceptions of fairness. Satisfaction plays an important role in predicting behavioral intentions and has a significant role in tourists’ willingness to re-visit, community involvement, environmentally responsible behavior, WHS preservation, and support for tourist development [21,106]. Community satisfaction refers to residents’ overall sentiment and subjective evaluation of various aspects of community, and is a comprehensive and multi-level index system, which is the cumulative result of people’s micro feelings and an important part of residence and life satisfaction. Measures of community resident satisfaction are mostly gauged by residents’ satisfaction with the general population, comparison with expectations, and other areas [43,74]. The QOL of the community residents who work in tourist destinations is greatly affected by the influx of tourism, and the support attitudes of residents are critical to the growth, competitiveness and sustainability of tourism. Tourist development needs to consider not only its economic results, but also analyze the relationship between tourist development and the life of the natives, with the improvement of community life satisfaction as an important development goal [9,43,107]. Kim et al. (2013) further pointed out that relevant studies are needed to better understand how tourism impacts the overall well-being of community residents, constructing a model of the tourist influences (economy, society, culture, and environment) on the QOL (material, emotional, and health and safety well-being) [9]. Research confirms that tourism creates jobs for residents, increases tax revenues, and improves service facilities, which can be seen as indicators of a higher standard of living for individuals [26,77]. On the other hand, tourist development could have negative impacts such as polluting the environment, increasing the cost of living and causing congestion, increasing friction between residents and tourists, and destroying the traditional culture of the community, all of which will reduce the QOL of residents [53,67,68]. Satisfaction is another factor that influences the host community’s supportive behaviors towards tourist development, and positive responses of the host community towards tourism development are very important for the satisfaction of the native community [108]. The resident satisfaction drivers of tourism development encompass resident expectations, sense of community belonging, tourism benefits and profit distribution, and positive–negative tourism impact perceptions. The study of community satisfaction includes the measurement, patterns, and influencing factors, which are classified into physical environment, location and accessibility, facilities and services, social and economic environment, and personal characteristics [70]. In general, economic benefits and environmental sustainability positively affect QOL and social costs negatively contribute to QOL [59]. Community residents’ satisfaction plays a supportive role in tourism development, with positive influence perceptions of community residents playing a positive role, while tourism development impact perceptions are also influenced by neighborhood, commitment, and service of community [74]. Furthermore, related studies have shown that overall community satisfaction has an impact on the perceived benefits–costs and has a positive influence on supporting tourist development [43,70,74].
Scholars have argued that host communities’ positive responses to tourist development are important to local community satisfaction, which is linked to perceived positive tourist effects [21,55]. For tourism communities in WHS, tourist community satisfaction refers to the psychological state of pleasure or disappointment that residents experience when comparing their expectations of local tourism development with their actual feelings, and the correlation between their perceptions of tourist impacts, community involvement, satisfaction and attitudes toward tourist development [21,46]. Heritage community inhabitants are one of the core stakeholders in heritage tourism development and their satisfaction has a significant impact on the planning decisions, management governance, development operations and processes of heritage tourism development, and especially positive perceptions have a significant positive effect on community satisfaction, and vice versa [46]. Relevant scholars have incorporated community satisfaction into the theoretical model of community tourism support, showing that the improvement of community satisfaction is conducive to the promotion of community participation and sustainable development, and especially the residents of WHS are better satisfied with local tourist development. The residents are classified into three categories: positive satisfiers, rational satisfiers, and moderate satisfiers, with a few groups of dissatisfied people [32]. Community satisfaction and perceived tourist influence are in a direct interaction, with positive influences leading to greater satisfaction, and vice versa. Gurson and Rutherford use “cost-benefit” as an entry point to examine resident satisfaction, dividing costs–benefits into economic, social, and cultural [50]. Cottrell et al. used SEM to predict residents’ satisfaction with sustainable tourist development through environmental, economic, sociocultural, and institutional dimensions [86]. Related scholars have measured the subjective well-being of residents’ cognitive and affective adoption of the life satisfaction scale [109]. For tourism communities in WHS, residents’ QOL, tourism satisfaction and community well-being lead to the measurement of overall satisfaction of WHS communities and are representative and appropriate.
Based on the research overview, a study hypothesis path is proposed to construct a conceptual model of community satisfaction with tourism to World Heritage Sites mediated by place attachment from the perspective of perceived benefits–costs of heritage tourism to community residents:
Cost perception has a significant positive influence on community satisfaction.
Cost perception has a significant positive influence on place attachment.
Cost perception is related to community satisfaction indirectly, via place attachment.
Benefit perception has a significant positive influence on place attachment.
Benefit perception has a significant positive influence on community satisfaction.
Benefit perception is related to community satisfaction indirectly, via place attachment.
Place attachment has a significant positive influence on community satisfaction.
The suggested conceptual framework is shown in Figure 1.
3. Research Design and Sample Acquisition
3.1. Case Site Overview
Located in Shangrao City, Jiangxi Province, China, the Mount Sanqingshan National Park covers an area of 229.5 square kilometers with beautiful scenery and a flourishing Taoist culture, which was highly praised by the poet Bai Li, who was a great poet of the Tang Dynasty in 618–907 A.D. (素手把芙蓉,虚步蹑太清,霓裳拽广带,恍惚升天行). The MSNP was listed as a World Natural Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2008 and a national AAAAA tourist resort in 2011, and is known as “the most beautiful granite on the edge of the Western Pacific Ocean” and “an open-air Taoist museum” (Figure 2). After MSNP was crowned as a WHS, the tourist industry has grown rapidly, from 580,000 tourist arrivals and 210 million RMB in tourism revenue in 2002 to 23,955,000 and 22 billion RMB in 2019. The MSNP has fully considered the interests of the communities in its heritage conservation and management, arranging for local residents to engage in environmental protection, sanitation and business services, and also implementing a series of policies to benefit the people. The local communities have gained greater social and economic benefits, and the relationship between “preserving the scenery” and “enriching the people” has been properly handled. The awareness and ability of community residents to participate in conservation and management has been increasing, and a promising situation has gradually emerged from passive to active participation in the management of resources, which has provided a strong guarantee for the implementation of the WHS conservation and management planning. Furthermore, there have been some negative impacts, and local communities have paid the associated costs.
3.2. Questionnaire Design
The questionnaire consisted of two parts: the first part looked at the demographics of residents of the tourist communities in MSNP, mainly including gender, age, monthly income, occupation, level of education, years of residence, tourism practice and community involvement. The second part examined the participation of heritage tourism community residents in the community and the difficulties they face. It consists of twenty six questions profiling four dimensions of perceived benefits and costs of heritage tourism, place attachment and community satisfaction based on the perceptions of residents of heritage tourist communities, mainly derived from the research team’s questionnaires, field surveys and face-to-face interviews with various stakeholders such as residents, heritage site managers, tourists and tourism entrepreneurs from 2012 to 2015 in MSNP, and revised by combining the results of the relevant research literature. Among them, the perceived costs of tourism communities in heritage sites consist of eight measurement questions covering three aspects: economic, social and environmental [50,68,71,72,73,80]. The perceived benefits dimension includes eleven measures, containing economic, social and heritage conservation aspects [50,63,74,110]. The five measures of the place attachment dimension were mainly drawn from the relevant literature [96,98,99]. The community satisfaction dimension includes satisfaction with community life and tourism development and contains two measurement questions [111,112,113]. A Likert five-point scale was applied to calculate the level of agreement of the participants on each measure (1 strongly disagree or very dissatisfied, 5 strongly agree or very satisfied). To obtain a deeper understanding of residents’ perceptions of tourist development, an open-ended question was asked at the end of the questionnaire: “What issues do you think exist in local tourist development and what suggestions do you have?”
3.3. Sampling Instructions
Under the guidance of three professors, the research team consisted of eight current undergraduate, master’s and doctoral students who participated in the questionnaire design and training in questionnaire distribution. The distribution targets were residents and tourism practitioners in the communities near the entrance of the main scenic spots of MSNP and its surrounding areas, which are closely linked to the development of heritage tourism. We adopted a combination of convenience sampling and random sampling survey methods. In order to improve the excellence of the survey, the survey mainly applied a combination of semi-structured interviews and questionnaire completion, and we explained and assisted in completing the questionnaire for some residents who had difficulties in understanding the survey due to their low education level. To improve the recovery rate and quality of the questionnaire and to show appreciation, small gifts such as towels and keychains were given to the interviewees. The research team distributed 330 questionnaires from 9–16 August 2015, and 280 questionnaires were collected, excluding those that were not filled out carefully, incompletely, or illogically; a total of 263 valid questionnaires were obtained, with a valid recovery rate of 79.7%. Meantime, new questions identified by the research team and new clues provided by the subjects during the questionnaire process were recorded and followed up with ongoing communication in recent years in order to facilitate a deeper insight of the comprehensive effect of World Heritage tourism in local communities.
3.4. Analysis Methodology
This study used structural equation modelling (SEM) for validation analysis, a method for building, estimating, and testing causal models that is widely used in social science research. In this study, SPSS22.0 statistical software was applied to treat the sample information, and AMOS19.0 (SPSS Inc., Chicago, IL, USA) was utilized to perform SEM and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA). When adopting the structural equation model, firstly, the reliability and validity of the sample should be analyzed, and secondly, the model parameters should be tested for the presence of counter-estimate hypotheses and common method biases (CMB) in the theoretical model, and in the validation analysis, the variance test of the single-factor common method can be used.
4. Empirical Results and Validation
4.1. Sample Characteristics
The overall sample of this study was 42.9% male and 57.1% female; the age was mostly young adults aged 19–45 years (76.4%); education level was mainly junior high school and high school (71.1%). In terms of the composition of the population’s place of residence, 57.6% of local residents had resided there for more than 10 years, 32.2% for less than 5 years, and the sample was 85.6% of the city’s population, including 74.6% in Yushan County, where MSNP is located, which coincides with the development of tourism with the local population as the main force. The average monthly income is mainly concentrated around RMB 2000, which is in line with the local agricultural population and the late start of tourism development. In terms of occupational composition, tourism practitioners (44.9%) and individual private owners (28.0%) dominated, with hotel, B&B and farmhouse staff (31.2%) and small store owners (21.7%) occupying half of the total, and heritage site management and service staff accounting for about 20%, while a survey of the number of people engaged in tourism sections per household in the sample showed one (41.8%) and two (30.5%), indicating that the development of local heritage tourism has brought more employment opportunities, which is in line with the results of the field survey targeting tourist development in MSNP (Table 1). On the whole, the demographic base signs and tourism participation performance of this sample represent the basic situation of MSNP, and thus is representative and reliable.
4.2. Reliability and Validity
At the 0.001 significance level, the consequences demonstrated that the overall sample Cronbach’s α value was 0.828, which was greater than 0.8, showing that the internal reliability of the sample was effective, and the reliability coefficients of each dimension Cronbach’s α were 0.736, 0.852, 0.856, and 0.624, which were greater than 0.6, indicating that the reliability of each dimension has reached the threshold. The overall sample sphericity test (Kaiser Meyer Olkin, KMO) value was 0.843, which is greater than 0.8, indicating a good structural validity of the sample; the content validity KMO values were 0.750, 0.834, 0.824, and 0.500, indicating that the designed measurement questions are representative of the content to be measured, where the satisfaction dimension KMO value of 0.5 is low but appropriate. The average variance extracted (AVE) values of 0.61, 0.71, 0.53, and 0.50 for cost perception, benefit perception, place attachment, and heritage tourism community satisfaction, respectively, generally indicate that the observed variables could gauge the latent variables to which they belong; the composite reliability (CR) values were 0.82, 0.88, 0.85, and 0.66, which were greater than 0.6, suggesting that the reliability of the model was suitable. The overall validity and reliability tests indicated that the samples were appropriate for factor analysis. These results indicate that the correlation coefficients are less than the square root of AVE, except for the association coefficients of cost perception and place attachment to community satisfaction, which demonstrates that the discriminant validity needs further investigation [114] (Table 2).
To further verify the discriminant validity, the chi-squared value test was used [115]. If the chi-square difference values of these two models do not reach a significant difference, it denotes that there is no discriminant validity among the two constructs, which signifies that H0: Φ = 1 can be accepted. The chi-square difference value Δχ2 between these two restricted and unrestricted models was weightier than 3.85 (df = 1, p < 0.001), which indicates reaching a significant aim [116]. The outcomes of the examination are listed in Table 3, with chi-squared values of 17.366 and 32.856 for each paired dimension (df = 1, p < 0.001), indicating that this construct has differential validity (Table 3).
4.3. Measurement Model
To examine hypothetical associations among latent variables in measurement model, the structural model was verified and estimated. At first, the samples were tested for multivariate orthogonality, and the absolute values of the observed variables were tested to be 0.039~1.508 for skewness, which is fewer than the threshold of 2.58, and 0.058~2.224 for kurtosis, which is fewer than the threshold of 8. Thus, the sample data could be regarded as conforming to the multivariate orthogonal distribution. Secondly, the CMB estimating announced that bias happened while the same rate responded to all the questionnaires in the self-administered field survey, and artificial covariation between predictor variables to effector variables was triggered by the similar measurement setting, project background, and project traits themselves. The cumulative contribution of the first factor in the exploratory factor analysis using Harman’s one-way test was 15.86%, signifying that the CMB was not severe enough to be negligible [117]. Furthermore, when investigating the general model fitness index, Hair et al. suggested that the model parameters should be tested for estimation violations in two ways: whether there are negative error variances and standardized parameter coefficients are weightier than or equal to 1 [118]. According to the test, the measured values of the error variance ranged from 0.017 to 0.156, and there was no negative error variance; the standardized parameter coefficients ranged from 0.468 to 0.905, none of which exceeded 1, indicating that the model did not violate the estimation phenomenon, and the overall model fit could be tested. Parameter estimation of the theoretical model using the method of maximum likelihood (ML) revealed that the relevant fit indices did not reach the desired values, and therefore further corrections to the model were required. Some of the potential variables could be connected, and cost perception and benefit perception are also theoretically linked. The modified structural model fit indices are comparatively perfect, and although the comparative index is slightly lower than the ideal value, all the indexes reach the ideal value and are generally acceptable [119] (Table 4 and Table 5).
4.4. Mediating Effects
This research adopts place attachment as a mediating variable to examine the mediating effects and perceived costs–benefits of community residents on satisfaction with tourist community involvement in WHS. To test the mediation effect, a 2000-sample test, using the bootstrap approach and Mackinnon’s PRODCLIN2 technique for testing indirect effects, showed that the mediating effects of place attachment on the perceived cost of the community participation and satisfaction with community participation bias-corrected 95% confidence interval and percentile 95% confidence interval do not contain 0, and two-tailed significance (TTS) tests are significant, while Mackinnon’s PRODCLIN2 95% confidence interval does not contain 0, indicating that a mediating impact exists and is fully mediated. The mediating effects of place attachment on perceived community benefit and community involvement satisfaction bias-corrected 95% and percentile 95% confidence interval do not contain 0, and TTS tests were significant, while Mackinnon’s PRODCLIN2 95% confidence interval did not contain 0, indicating that a mediating impact existed and was partially mediated [120] (Table 6).
4.5. Conceptual Model
The hypothesized causal correlations were verified and the observations of the assessment are stated in Figure 3 and Table 7.
5. Results and Discussion
5.1. Outcomes
The outcomes of the research hypotheses are shown in Figure 3 and Table 7, and all the assumptions are supported except for the H1 hypothesis.
The hypothesis H1 was not accepted, indicating that the perceived cost impact of tourism communities in WHS did not have a significant influence on community satisfaction. This may be linked to the rapid tourism development in MSNP since it has been listed as a WHS and the high economic benefits of tourism, as the mean value of the cost perception dimension is 3.20 and is characterized by a five-level Likert scale advocated by Tosun (the mean values ranging from 1.0 to 2.4 are objection; 2.5 to 3.4 are neutral; 3.5 to 5.0 are agreed), indicating a low cost perception of residents [121]. In particular, thanks to the development of the tourist industry in WHS, the infrastructure and landscape appearance in and around heritage tourism communities have been greatly improved. The tourist industry has empowered heritage communities to significantly improve their overall benefits, greatly enhancing the QOL and community satisfaction [20,25,26,44]. It is also possible that because the tourism industry in WHS is in an upward cycle, the negative impacts of tourism are somewhat overlooked by community residents, and even the perceived benefits overshadow the perceived costs [42], suggesting that tourism cost perceptions do not necessarily lead to dissatisfaction and do not always have a negative influence on community satisfaction. There are also relevant findings showing that tourism cost affects perceptions and brings negative effects on community satisfaction [4,8,13]. The hypothesis of H5 is supported, demonstrating that the tourist development in WHS brings benefits to residents of tourism communities (the mean value of tourism benefit perception is 3.84) and improves the standard of living and happiness of local residents, verifying that tourist benefit perception has a significant positive effect on community satisfaction [14,20,33,52]. Especially through heritage tourism development and extensive community involvement, the awareness of local community residents of WHS conservation has also been raised (the mean value of the WHS conservation perception is 3.75), which is crucial for the conservation of World Heritage properties [2,18,30,34,41].
The hypothesis of H2 was supported, indicating that the perceived cost of tourism has a significant negative influence on place attachment of residents in heritage tourist communities. Place attachment is a stable emotional connection formed by local community residents living and working for a long time, and is more sensitive to external influences [94]. The over-commercialization, over-tourism, environmental pollution, crowding and noise, and disparity between rich and poor brought about by the local development of heritage tourism may have a negative impact on place attachment, especially on the core values (OUV) of WHS [14,25,27,28]. Furthermore, there are also relevant conclusions indicating that cost perceptions do not necessarily have a negative impact on place attachment, suggesting that the results may vary across case sites with various stages of tourism development and different development cycles [89]. The hypothesis of H4 is supported, signifying that the perception of tourism benefits has a significant positive influence on place attachment of tourist communities in WHS. The development of heritage tourism brings tangible benefits and convenience to the lives, livelihoods and production of local communities, which enhances the sense of home and community attachment of the people and is more conducive to the conservation and management of WHS [14,20,22,25,122].
The hypotheses of H3 and H6 were accepted, indicating the existence of a mediating effect of place attachment. H3, the role of tourist cost perceptions on community satisfaction via place attachment, was fully mediated, suggesting that the role of tourism cost perceptions on community satisfaction was unclear; H6, the role of tourism benefit perceptions on community satisfaction via place attachment, was partially mediated, showing that place attachment and benefit tourist perceptions act together on community satisfaction [9,55]. Meanwhile, the hypothesis of H7 was supported, indicating that place attachment has an important positive influence on community satisfaction, with a higher mean value of 4.17 for the place attachment dimension, suggesting that residents of heritage communities have a high emotional attachment to their local area and community, based on long-term residence on the one hand, and possibly because heritage tourism development further enhances place attachment and community attachment on the other hand [18]. The above findings adequately demonstrate that the perceived benefits of tourist communities and the place-loving sentiments possessed by the residents of WHS have a significant contribution to community satisfaction, which is a boon to sustainable tourism development and heritage conservation in WHS [9,43,107].
In summary, World Heritage tourism communities have reaped considerable benefits from the development of heritage tourist industry, enhancing place attachment and satisfaction of heritage communities, while at the same time paying a price [21,46,59]. The influence of WHS on heritage tourism communities is to be viewed dialectically from an integrated, critical and developmental perspective. Based on the above analysis, we constructed a comprehensive framework of ’SHE~ABC’ (Figure 4)for the satisfaction of tourism communities in WHS from the perspective of the perceptions of heritage tourism communities, including the antecedent influences ‘SHE’ (Social determinants, Heritage ecology and Economic development), the intermediate transformations ‘ABC’ (place Attachment, perceived Benefits and Costs of heritage tourism), and the end-point satisfaction with life and tourism development in heritage tourism communities, which explore more comprehensively, objectively and dialectically the effects on the WHS tourist industry in native communities and residents in the practice of heritage tourist development, with the aim to protect World Heritage properties more efficiently and scientifically, better achieving the objective of healthy and sustainable development of World Heritage businesses and the tourist industry.
5.2. Theoretical and Managerial Implications
From a theoretical perspective, this study investigates World Heritage tourism community satisfaction based on community participation theory, place attachment theory, and SET, with WHS tourism community benefit–cost perceptions and place attachment as antecedent variables. In accordance with the characteristics of tourism development, community participation and heritage conservation and value transmission in WHS, a tourism impact perception scale with features of WHS was developed, especially regarding heritage conservation, environmental protection and ecology, and preservation of traditions, which makes this study more consistent with the real situation of tourism impacting perceptions of heritage tourism communities in WHS. Using place attachment as the mediating variable and tourist cost–benefit perception as the antecedent variable to study its role on the satisfaction of World Heritage communities expands the perspective of previous studies that have more often used satisfaction and influence perception as antecedent variables to explore the role on place attachment, which helps us to take a more comprehensive and dialectical view of the fit between theoretical hypotheses and practical perceptions.
From the perspective of scientific conservation and management of WHS, community participation channels, degree of community participation, community emotional connection and perceived benefits–costs of community participation should be given sufficient attention. On the one hand, the social capital, cultural capital, industrial capital and place-loving sentiments possessed by community aborigines have certain advantages for scientific conservation of WHS, which could better protect heritage and transmit OUV, and promote sustainable development of the heritage business and tourist industry. On the other hand, we could pay more emphasis to tourist benefits distribution, community participation, democratic decision-making, economic empowerment of tourist development in heritage areas, and training of community residents in tourism practice skills, heritage conservation methods and community participation paths. Meanwhile, with the explosion of tourism in heritage sites, the over-tourism and related threats brought by oversized tourist capacity, it is necessary to: moderately control the number of visitors and the size of the tourist industry based on the principle of heritage conservation first and utilization second; scientifically guide the healthy and benign development of heritage tourism; convince local community residents to focus on preserving OUV and local traditional cultural practices; accept and welcome tourists; build a harmonious relationship between host and client; enhance the sense of belonging of heritage community and the pride of residents, so as to improve the QOL, wellbeing and satisfaction of World Heritage tourist communities, and so that family businesses and the tourist industry develop together in a harmonious and healthy way. Just as the Confucian master Zhongshu Dong of the Han Dynasty (202 B.C.–220 A.D.) suggested: the correlation amid the Heaven, the Earth, and the People is equalized and is a harmonious philosophical thought (天生之, 地养之, 人成之).
5.3. Limitations and Research Directions
Based on certain shortcomings of this paper, directions were proposed for future research. First, this study constructs a research model of community satisfaction based on heritage tourist community impact perceptions and place attachment, whose appropriateness and generalizability need to be improved. If community empowerment, sense of deprivation of community participation, degree of community involvement, and heritage conservation education and other influencing factors are also taken into account, it may be possible to assess heritage tourism community satisfaction more scientifically and comprehensively. Secondly, the case selection of this study is mainly based on the more closely connected communities of WHS, without fully considering the degree of association with tourist industry development, which to some extent affects the universal applicability of the study findings. In the future, the distribution of different spatial scales of tourism communities and the degree of involvement of heritage tourism communities can be used to more precisely explore the QOL, community satisfaction and well-being of inhabitants in WHS, and the mechanism of good resident perception and well-being to promote World Heritage conservation. Thirdly, the WHS of MSNP, which is the case site of this study, is a Taoist destination and is affected by Taoist culture and philosophy, and especially those philosophical thoughts that impact the heritage conservation of community residents are worth studying. As for combining the harmony between the Heaven and People (天人合一), traditional Chinese thinking and philosophical concepts of survival and life of the ordinary people highlight good-neighborliness, mutual help (是亲必顾, 是邻必护), and attachment to hometowns (百年为客老, 一念爱乡深), in order to better reveal the inner mechanism of the satisfaction of tourist community participation in World Heritage regions, which is conducive to the sustainable development of WHS conservation and the tourist industry. Fourth, the relationship between different influencing factors and residents’ perceptions, community attachments and attitudinal behaviors is shaped by the stage and conditions of heritage tourist development, and needs to be empirically studied in the context of heritage tourist development in China. Although some scholars have conducted localized explorations, few theories have been constructed. In the future, a combination of qualitative and quantitative research methodologies can be used to explore the essence behind the phenomenon in depth and promote theoretical innovation and a new framework construction, not only using SEM, as SEM also has limitations to some extent. In addition, this study is based on China’s collectivist system in the context of socialist developing countries and has its own characteristics in accordance with China’s cultural background and traditional philosophical thought, which may differ from the non-collectivist system, the cultural context, and the philosophical concepts possessed by Western capitalist countries, and these are the directions of future research worth exploring.
6. Conclusions
This research selects the tourist community of the World Natural Heritage site of MSNP, and applies SEM techniques, relying on community participation theory and SET to discover the mechanisms of community residents’ perceptions of tourist effects and place attachment on the satisfaction of tourism communities in WHS. First, a tourist cost–benefit perception scale for heritage site residents with the characteristics of tourism communities in WHS is developed, and a theoretical framework of heritage tourism impact perception, place attachment and community satisfaction is constructed. Second, the study shows that the perceived benefits of World Heritage tourist communities have a significant positive influence on place attachment and community satisfaction, suggesting that the perception of tourist benefits can enhance community attachment, community satisfaction and well-being. Residents’ perception of tourist cost has a substantial negative effect on community satisfaction, while the influences on place attachment are not significant, demonstrating that community satisfaction is more sensitive than place attachment. Third, place attachment has a significant positive influence on community satisfaction, indicating that place attachment enhances heritage tourism community satisfaction, which is complementary to the findings of related scholars’ studies on community satisfaction promoting community attachment. Meanwhile, place attachment has a fully mediating effect on tourist cost perception and satisfaction of heritage tourism communities, and a partially mediating effect on tourist benefit perception and satisfaction, which shows that place attachment plays a key role in promoting heritage conservation and enhancing satisfaction and well-being of WHS communities. Finally, we propose the ‘SHE-ABC’ framework of WHS tourist community satisfaction based on the perspectives of heritage tourism community participation impact perception and place attachment, which further expands the boundaries and horizons of tourism community involvement study in WHS, and this outline has theoretical and practical implications for heritage tourist community involvement, heritage conservation, tourist industry development and sustainability of World Heritage region.
S.N. designed this research, analyzed the sample, and wrote the manuscript., F.L., M.C. and G.C. provided related advice. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.
Ethical approval and informed consent has been reviewed.
Informed consent was obtained from all subjects involved in the study.
No data available to share at this time.
We are grateful to the UNESCO program about visitor management planning toward to MSNP tourism industry (4500193250), the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of the PRC to MSNP (13TABK007), and the MSNP Administrative, and to research team who assisted with the questionnaire distribution.
The authors have no potential conflict of interest to declare.
Footnotes
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![View Image - Figure 1. The conceptual model and research hypotheses. Note: [Image omitted. Please see PDF.] directly affect; [Image omitted. Please see PDF.] indirectly affect.](https://media.proquest.com/media/hms/THUM/2/WHNQQ?_a=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%2BgIBWYIDA1dlYooDHENJRDoyMDI2MDUwMTIwNTk0NzEzNzoxNzMyNjA%3D&_s=E7t%2FwDXExUJWcNELuugYBgzjlXY%3D "View Image - Figure 1. The conceptual model and research hypotheses. Note: [Image omitted. Please see PDF.] directly affect; [Image omitted. Please see PDF.] indirectly affect.")
Enlarge this image.Figure 1. The conceptual model and research hypotheses. Note: [Image omitted. Please see PDF.] directly affect; [Image omitted. Please see PDF.] indirectly affect.
Enlarge this image.Figure 2. The MSNP location and landscape.
Enlarge this image.Figure 3. Structural model analysis marks; *** significance at the 0.001 level, ** significance at the 0.01 level.
Enlarge this image.Figure 4. Tourist community participation and satisfaction ‘SHE~ABC’ framework in WHS.
Sample characteristics (n = 263).
| Items | % | Items | % | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gender | Male | 42.9 | Income |
≤500 | 9.8 |
| Female | 57.1 | 501–1000 | 14.7 | ||
| Age group (years) | ≤18 | 3.1 | 1001–2000 | 40.0 | |
| 19–25 | 20.3 | 2001–3000 | 24.5 | ||
| 26–45 | 56.1 | ≥3001 | 11.0 | ||
| 46–65 | 20.1 | Profession | Individual private owner | 28.0 | |
| ≥66 | 0.4 | Tourist practitioners | 44.9 | ||
| Education | Primary school and below | 11.1 | Farmer | 14.2 | |
| Middle school | 36.9 | Worker | 1.6 | ||
| High school | 34.2 | Student | 2.8 | ||
| College graduate and above | 17.8 | Other | 8.5 | ||
| Length of residence (years) | ≤5 | 32.2 | Types of community tourism practitioner occupations | Hotel catering staff | 31.2 |
| 6–10 | 10.2 | Tourist small store owner | 21.7 | ||
| 11–20 | 10.2 | Scenic area service staff | 14.3 | ||
| ≥21 | 47.4 | Tourist store staff | 11.1 | ||
| Place of residence | Shangrao City | 85.6 | Community mobile merchant | 9.5 | |
| Yushan County (included) | 74.6 | Tourist agency managers | 6.9 | ||
| Outside of Shangrao City | 14.4 | Travel agent staff | 5.3 | ||
| Tourist practitioner per household | 0 persons | 8.8 | 2 persons | 30.5 | |
| 1 persons | 41.8 | ≥3 persons | 18.7 | ||
The discriminant validity of latent variables.
| Variable | Cost Perception | Benefit Perception | Place Attachment | Community Satisfaction |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost perception | 0.781 | |||
| Benefit Perception | 0.063 | 0.843 | ||
| Place attachment | −0.256 ** | 0.560 *** | 0.728 | |
| Community satisfaction | −0.256 * | 0.791 *** | 0.719 *** | 0.710 |
Note: *, **, and ***, significant at the 0.05, 0.01, and 0.001 levels, respectively.
Chi-square difference value examining.
| Latent Variables | χ2 | Δχ2 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Constrained Model | The Unconstrained Model | (df = 1, p < 0.001) | |
| Cov (Benefit Perception, Community satisfaction) | 244.628 (df = 64) | 227.262 (df = 63) | 17.366 |
| Cov (Place attachment, Community satisfaction) | 160.309 (df = 16) | 127.453 (df = 15) | 32.856 |
Composition and analysis of structural scales.
| Structural Dimensions | Measurement Items | Mean Value | Standard Deviation | Factor Loading | Cronbach’s α | AVE | CR | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cost perception | Economic Costs | Tourist development leads to increase in local prices | 3.71 | 1.216 | 0.58 | 0.74 | 0.61 | 0.82 |
| Tourist development widens the gap between rich and poor | 3.42 | 1.150 | ||||||
| Tourist development leads to increase in local house and land prices | 3.72 | 1.274 | ||||||
| Social Costs | Tourist development leads to an overly commercialized local atmosphere | 3.52 | 1.005 | 0.90 | ||||
| Tourist development destroys the local simple folklore | 3.02 | 1.207 | ||||||
| Tourist development has led to an increase in pornography, gambling and drugs | 2.13 | 1.197 | ||||||
| Environmental Costs | Tourist development leads to increased environmental pollution | 3.09 | 1.322 | 0.84 | ||||
| Environmental pollution affects the life and health of local residents | 3.00 | 1.253 | ||||||
| Benefit Perception | Economic Benefits | Tourist development has increased the income of local residents | 3.82 | 1.045 | 0.89 | 0.85 | 0.71 | 0.88 |
| Tourist development increases local employment opportunities | 3.94 | 0.989 | ||||||
| Tourist development attracts more foreign investment | 3.76 | 1.089 | ||||||
| Tourist development promotes infrastructure | 3.67 | 1.153 | ||||||
| Social Gain | Tourist development enhances the image of local communities | 3.92 | 1.120 | 0.72 | ||||
| Tourist development increases opportunities for interaction with the outside world | 3.89 | 0.984 | ||||||
| Tourist development raises local awareness | 4.22 | 1.010 | ||||||
| Tourist development attracts villagers from abroad to return home | 3.73 | 0.995 | ||||||
| Heritage Conservation | Tourist development promotes the preservation and transmission of cultural customs in heritage sites | 3.69 | 1.169 | 0.92 | ||||
| Tourist development to better protect heritage sites and relics | 3.59 | 1.151 | ||||||
| Tourist development to better protect the natural ecology of heritage sites | 3.96 | 1.080 | ||||||
| Place Attachment | I have a deep affection for S MSNP | 4.16 | 0.990 | 0.78 | 0.86 | 0.53 | 0.85 | |
| I would like to live in MSNP for a long time | 4.04 | 1.108 | 0.70 | |||||
| I am used to living in MSNP | 4.06 | 0.979 | 0.73 | |||||
| I am very concerned about the overall development of MSNP | 4.35 | 0.899 | 0.73 | |||||
| I am very concerned about the development of tourist industry in MSNP | 4.23 | 0.941 | 0.69 | |||||
| Community Satisfaction | I am satisfied with my life in MSNP | 3.76 | 1.093 | 0.55 | 0.62 | 0.50 | 0.66 | |
| I am satisfied with the development of tourist industry in MSNP | 3.70 | 1.175 | 0.83 | |||||
Goodness-of-fit indices testing.
| Model Fit |
Absolute Index | Comparative Index | Parsimony Index | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CMIN/DF | GFI | RMSEA | IFI | TLI | CFI | PGFI | PNFI | PCFI | |
| Threshold value | 1–3 | >0.90 | <0.08 | >0.90 | >0.90 | >0.90 | >0.50 | >0.50 | >0.50 |
| Theoretical model (M1) | 2.365 | 0.829 | 0.072 | 0.841 | 0.818 | 0.839 | 0.680 | 0.668 | 0.743 |
| Structural model (M2) | 2.099 | 0.850 | 0.065 | 0.874 | 0.854 | 0.872 | 0.688 | 0.686 | 0.762 |
Mediation effects of cost perception and benefit perception perceptions on community satisfaction related to place attachment operating bootstrapping and Mackinnon’s PRODCLIN2 methods.
| Variables | Point Estimate | Product of Coefficients | Bootstrapping | Mackinnon’s PRODCLIN2 95% CI | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bias-Corrected 95% CI | Percentile 95% CI | ||||||||||
| Total effect | S.E. | Z | Lower | Upper | Two-tailed significance | Lower | Upper | Two-tailed significance | Lower | Upper | |
| CP | −0.259 | 0.095 | −2.73 | −0.440 | −0.054 | 0.021 | −0.278 | −0.036 | 0.024 | ||
| BP | 0.835 | 0.113 | 7.55 | 0.424 | 0.865 | 0.001 | 0.410 | 0.860 | 0.001 | ||
| Direct effect | |||||||||||
| CP | −0.090 | 0.104 | −0.84 | −0.325 | 0.098 | 0.406 | −0.309 | 0.115 | 0.450 | ||
| BP | 0.387 | 0.161 | 2.40 | −0.005 | 0.608 | 0.05 | −0.007 | 0.608 | 0.054 | ||
| Indirect effect | |||||||||||
| CP | −0.172 | 0.065 | −2.65 | −0.290 | −0.033 | 0.016 | −0.266 | −0.014 | 0.030 | −0.337 | −0.046 |
| BP | 0.4448 | 0.083 | 5.40 | 0.228 | 0.574 | 0.000 | 0.205 | 0.526 | 0.001 | 0.205 | 0.781 |
Note: CP, cost perception; BP, benefit perception.
Short hypotheses analysis marks.
| Hypotheses | SRW | C.R. | Consequences | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| H1. | Community satisfaction | <--- | Cost perception | −0.07 | −0.94 | Rejected |
| H2. | Place attachment | <--- | Cost perception | −0.24 ** | −2.54 | Accepted |
| H3. | The cost perception is indirectly related to the community satisfaction via place attachment | Accepted | ||||
| H4. | Place attachment | <--- | Benefit perception | 0.59 *** | 5.71 | Accepted |
| H5. | Community satisfaction | <--- | Benefit perception | 0.31 *** | 2.60 | Accepted |
| H6. | The benefit perception is indirectly related to community satisfaction via place attachment | Accepted | ||||
| H7. | Community satisfaction | <--- | Place attachment | 0.62 *** | 5.74 | Accepted |
Note: *** significance at 0.001 level, *** p < 0.001, ** p < 0.01.
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