Statistical Analysis of Travel and Tourism Destinations: Report

This report presents a statistical analysis of the travel and tourism industry, focusing on destination choices and tourist motivations in Southern Switzerland and Northern Italy, particularly Lugano, Como, and Milan. The study investigates the influence of destination choice on tourist age, the impact of age on core destination choice motivations (relaxation, natural beauty, outdoor activities, culture, and social life), and the effect of destination on attribute strengths. The research employs a primary data collection method using questionnaires administered to 1500 tourists, with a sample size reduction to 600 for destination-specific analysis. Statistical techniques, including descriptive statistics (mean and standard deviation) and inferential statistics (ANOVA and Tukey post hoc tests), are used to analyze the data. The findings aim to provide insights for the Lugano Tourism Board to develop effective positioning strategies and enhance tourism in the region by understanding the preferences of different age groups and the strengths of each destination.

Statistics for travel and
tourism

Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................1
Client description.........................................................................................................................1
Research questions.......................................................................................................................1
Practical Importance....................................................................................................................1
Method.............................................................................................................................................2
Data Collection............................................................................................................................2
Data analysis................................................................................................................................3
Findings...........................................................................................................................................6
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................15
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................16

Introduction
Client description
Statistics can be defined as the process of analysis of information which is gathered from
different types of sources. With the help of it, solution for all the research problems could be
figured as it supports qualitative and quantitative assessment of data. It is a form of mathematical
analysis in which quantified models so that conclusions could be drawn. Travel and tourism is a
big sector which is creating employment around the world at a higher level. Present report is
based upon determination of statistics of this industry (Adukaite, Cantoni and Kalbaska, 2016).
Lugano Tourist Board is the legal authority which is responsible for development of tourism in
Swiss city. Lugano which is one of the tourist’s attractions in Switzerland has unwarranted
image as a sleepy destination. In order to enhance number of visitors here different elements are
analysed in this report. These are influence of destination upon the age of tourists and age
category on the importance of core destination choice motivations. Apart from this, influence of
the destination on strength of attributes such as relaxation, natural beauty, outdoor activities,
culture and social life for tourists to the destination is also covered in this report.
Research questions
 Analysis of influence of destination choice on the age of tourists to Southern Switzerland
or Northern Italy
 Analysis of influence of age of tourists on importance of core destination choice
motivations for tourists to Southern Switzerland or Northern Italy
 Analysis of influence of destination on strength of attributes for tourists to Southern
Switzerland or Northern Italy
Practical Importance
The research questions which are developed above will help in devising a positioning
strategy for Lugano Tourism Board that will help them in gaining competitive advantage against
their direct competitors which are Como and Milan. Each of the above questions will help in
gaining interesting insights and create strategies that will increase the level of tourism in Lugano.
The first research question developed will help in identifying and analysing the impact
which the choice of destination levies upon the age of the tourists. This question will help in
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gaining the insights about the current tourism market and what strategies can Lugano Tourism
Board develop in order to attract new tourists of all age groups.
The second research question is developed to first identify the motivational factors which
influence a tourist while selecting a destination. This question has a practical implication as it
will help in gaining the insights regarding the relationship between the age of a tourist and the
motivational factors that influence them.
The last and third research question will help in identifying the motivational factors which
influence tourist to select Lugano and its competitors. This question has a significant practical
implication as it will help in gaining the insights regarding strengths of Lugano.
All three research questions will together act as a base which will help Lugano Tourism
Board to develop their positioning strategy by considering the strengths of this destination. The
insights which will be gained from the analysis of these three questions will help Lugano
Tourism Board to develop strategies that will result into attracting new tourist. This analysis will
help in Lugano to reach at new market which is viable to make profits.
Method
Data Collection
The present investigation is a primary research, where it is important to gather data from
first hand sources. This investigation is intended to collect data from tourists of Southern
Switzerland and Northern Italy. As it has been seen that total tourists in such regions is near 30
million and for such large population, a sample size of 1500 tourist has been selected. These
1500 respondents will be the tourists who has been visited Southern Switzerland or Northern
Italy in 2016. For a big population like 30 million, 1500 participants will make an ideal sample
size. For the descriptive and inferential statistics, the confidence interval selected for 1500
participants is 95%. This confidence interval implies that the results which will be gained from
participants will have 5% of margin of error. This 5% will represent 385 respondents which will
overall justify this sample size for the entire population.
In this present research, the destination choices given to participants will be Lugano, Como
and Milan and as these choices will be only independent variable, the sample size is reduced to
600 as the population of interest will change from 30 to 18 million. In order to represent a
population of 18 million, 600 sample size is sufficient with a margin of error of 5%. In order to
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select these 600 participants, it is important to create a specific framework using which these
participants will be selected. Considering, the sample size as 600, the technique of random
probabilistic sampling will be used. Using this technique, from the entire population, randomly
600 people are selected which were contacted first. There is a viable limitation of this sampling
technique as well which limits the scope of this investigation. This limitation states that in case
of random probabilistic sampling technique, few participants are selected randomly but if some
of people from such sample refuses to be a part of the survey then non response bias will be
generated that will limit the generalisability of the research. But similar to every technique,
random probabilistic sampling also has few benefits which are this sampling technique is cost
effective and is simple to use, also this technique does not require any sampling frame. The data
which will be gained from 600 participants will be collected using a questionnaire. The data
collection instrument of questionnaire is a tool which allows to collect data and store it so that
the data can be further used for the purpose of analysis and developing strategies for Lugano
Tourism Board.
Data analysis
1. Analysis of influence of destination choice on the age of tourists to Southern Switzerland or
Northern Italy
Around the world there are various tourist destinations around the world which are visited
by tourists every year. Destination choice influences age of tourists because youngsters always
want to visit a place which is adventurous but old people want to visit a destination where
environment is very good and calm. Lugano is one of the main tourist’s attractions of Southern
Switzerland but it is underrated because of lower number of tourists. For the purpose of
analysing the influence of choice of destination upon the age data is gathered from 1500
individuals in context of Lugano and two of its competitors Como and Milan (Lugano Tourist
Board, 2020).
For the purpose of analysing the results 1500 respondents were selected so that the selected
destinations could be assessed in systematic manner. All of them were the tourists who are visiting
the three different destinations. The annual number of visitors to Lugano Region is round 30
million. So according to it the sample size of 1500 is very small but it is selected to estimate the
results for which this sample size is appropriate.
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In order to answer this question, a software application of SPSS will be used. This
application assists an investigator in conducting statistical analysis for socials sciences. This
question is based on cross sectional design in which there are two variables which are age and
destination choice. Average age of tourists for three destinations will be analysed using the
descriptive data tool of Mean and standard deviation. As the variable is count, descriptive
statistics will be used which will help in analysing the ages of 600 participants who were visiting
each of the destinations which are Lugano, Como and Milan. The average age will be computed
by SPSS application using an algorithm, this algorithm will sum up ages of all participants and
then will be divided with total number of participants.
In additional to descriptive statistics, inferential statistics will also be computed using same
software application of SPSS. The model of inferential statistics that will be used to analyse this
research question is one way ANOVA test. This parametric test was undertaken to determine
whether the difference between the average of the ages of respondents for each destination is
statically significant or not. One way ANOVA is a parametric test which is used to analyse the
normal data and in cases where there no significant evidence that the data is normal, it is
important to conduct a post hoc test. For the investigation question in average age of tourists of
three destinations is analysed, the post hoc test of Tukey was used in order to determine that
which pairs of tourists are different significantly, there pairs can be Lugano and Como, Como
and Milan and Lugano and Milan.
2. Analysis of influence of age of tourists on importance of core destination choice motivations
for tourists to Southern Switzerland or Northern Italy
All the tourists analyse different types of factors before visiting a new destination. It helps
them to select best place to visit that fits to their preferences. There are various types of factors
that are analysed by them before deciding to visit a new destination. These are natural beauty,
relaxation, social life, culture and outdoor activities. The age of tourists leave impact upon the
importance of destination choice motivations. In order to analyse it different age groups are
formulated which are 18 to 30, 31 to 50, 51 to 70 and 71+. The influence is analysed with the
help of analysis of different motivational factors which are analysed by different age groups.
From the table 2: average destination choice by age group different facts are determined (Che, Qi
and Luo, 2017).
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As this research question is cross sectional, the descriptive statistics will be used by
summing up the influence of each destination on strengths separately. Mean and standard
deviation for each motivational factors are computed separately by age group. Once the
descriptive statistics is computed, the analysis is carried on with inferential statistics. In this
question as well, the model of ANOVA test is selected to determine whether the mean value of
each attribute such as Relaxation, Natural beauty, outdoor activities, cultural and social are
significantly different between the age groups or not. For conducting this ANOVA test, two
categorical variables are used. First categorical variable is age group having 4 age groups 18 –
30, 31 – 50, 51 – 70 and 71+. Second categorical variable is motivational factors of three
destinations. Along with this ANOVA test, an additional post hoc test will also be undertaken
which is Tukey test. This post hoc test is used by investigator to identify whether which of the
pairs of the age group have different mean of motivational attributes. These pairs can be any two
age groups from the four age groups.
These ANOVA or inferential test also has practical applications as by using such analysis,
Lugano Tourism Board will have a base for making the analysis that which of the age group is
their target tourist and which age groups must be attracted more by implying age appropriate
positioning strategies.
3. Analysis of influence of destination on strength of attributes for tourists to Southern
Switzerland or Northern Italy
For the purpose of analysing the influence of destination on the strength of attributes for
tourists’ various types of tests were used. First of all, anova test was used for a sample of 600
visitors travelling to Lugano, Como and Milan in order to assess that there is a difference
between the mean age of tourists or not. The number of total travellers for these three places are
125 for Lugano, 230 for Como and 245 for Milan. The difference between the destinations were
determined by the anova test [F (2597)=9.587, p=.000]. Additionally, another test was also used
which are Turkey post hoc test. It was used to reveal that age of travellers for Lugano is high as
compared to the tourists in other two destinations.
All the attributes are the motivational factors which influence an individual to visit a
destination. Considering this fact, the influence of destination is analysed on the strengths of
attributes for tourists. The descriptive statistics is used to calculate the average strength of each
destination choice’s motivation. Furthermore, in this analysis, inferential statistics model of one
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way ANOVA is used under the software application of SPSS. This application allowed to
calculate the differences between each destination and by this the hypothesis will be tested that
whether the differences between destinations is significant or not. Similar to above two research
question, in this case as well a post hoc test will be conducted. The test of Tukey will be used to
identify that which pairs of destinations are different. The only difference between research
question 1 and 3 is that in first question the difference in destinations was determined by age and
in this question differences in three destinations was determined by the motivational factors or
attributes.
In order to analyse a data set, it is first important to clean and summarise the data so that it
can be used for analysis. The data set was analysed using two tools of descriptive statistics which
are Mean and standard deviation. In order to appropriately present the data set, the graphical
tools of bar chart are also used. All these tools are resulted in tables and graphs which are
appropriately interpreted in Evidence section of the findings.
Findings
Research question 1:
Evidence
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The research helped to analyse the following results:
From the column chart which is generated with the help of table 1: average tourist age by
destination choice it has been analysed that mean for Lugano is 68.7, for Como it is 53.2 and for
Milan it is 47.9. On the other hand, standard deviation for these three destinations are 6.7, 20.9
and 18.7. The chart is showing that average age of tourists who are visiting Lugano is 68.7 and
the age for Como and Milan it is 53.2 and 47.9 respectively (Bielenia-Grajewska and Cortes de
los Rios, 2017).
From the above analysis of the collected information it has been determined that in visitors
of Lugano the highest number is related with people around 68 to 69. Mostly visitors of it are
senior citizens who visit the destination for the purpose of relaxing and spending their vacations
after retirement. The analysis also reflects that number of young people and millennials in the
tourists of Lugano is very low. It is very important for the Board of the destination to make sure
that they attract new visitors so that revenues could be enhanced. For this purpose, the authority
is required to analyse all the problems that are affecting its number of tourists.
The descriptive statistics interpretation above has analysed that by age, each destination has
a difference as the mean age of tourist in Lugano is 68.7 years, in Como, it is 53.2 years and in
Millan, it is 47.9 years. But in order to check that whether this difference is significant or not, the
inferential statistics was also used. One way ANOVA results of this analysis was conducted for
this research question which is considered as appropriate when there is no variables. An
appropriate sample of 600 tourists has been taken which can justify the preference of 18 million
tourists in the selected visitor’s destinations. All 600 respondents were first divided into three
groups according to the destination which they visited. By the separation of groups, it has been
analysed that in group Lugano, there are 125 visitors, in Como, there are 230 visitors and in
Milan, there are total of 245 visitors. All of these visitors were selected using a random sampling
technique.
The results of one way ANOVA were (F(2,597) = 9.58, p = .000)). The selected confidence
interval for this analysis was 95%, or 0.05. As the significance value for this analysis is lower
than 0.05, it can be interpreted that there is a significant difference between the three destinations
when compared by the average age of their tourist. This analysis is further supported by the
Tukey’s post hoc test. The results of such test are representing that the average tourist age is 68.7
in case of Lugano which is the highest with a plus minus of 6.8. After Lugano, Como has second
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highest mean age of tourist with mean age of 53.2 and lastly, the tourist destination of Milan has
lowest mean age of their tourists as 47.9. The p value or the significance level between the
differences of Lugano and Como is .000 which implies statistical significant difference between
these two destination. Similar to this, p value between the Lugano and Milan is also .000
indicating significant difference but the p value of difference between Como and Milan is .689
which implies that the age of tourists of these two destination is not significantly different.
Insights
Some of the major challenges that are affecting the destination are as follows:
No positioning strategies: Lugano Board is not using any type of positioning strategy
which is affecting the number of visitors. Only those individuals are visiting it who are having
information about some of the key attractions of it. In order to deal with this problem, it is very
important for Lugano Board to formulate new positioning strategy and make sure that it markets
all its attractive places. The key factor which should be focused by the authority is to position the
adventurous activities which could be enjoyed by youth. It will help to attract large number of
new tourists and attain competition advantage in the industry as compare Milan and Como.
Lack of awareness about tourist places in Lugano among tourists: It is another
problem which is affecting revenues of Lugano. There are various tourists who are not aware of
the outdoor activities and night life at Lugano. In order to attract them it is essential for Lugano
Board to make sure that it is spreading awareness about the key places that could be visited
tourists to spend their vacations (Buhalis and Sinarta, 2019).
Strategy
In order to deal with all the above described problems following recommendations could be
focused by the board:
 Effective marketing and positioning strategy should be formulated as it will help to deal
with all the problems which are affecting tourism growth of the destination.
 The Lugano Board should take part in the awareness programs in which it will spread
awareness about the main tourism attractions of the destination.
By paying attention towards all the above described recommendations Lugano Board will
be able to enhance number of young tourists for destination and enhance the revenues.
Research question 2:
Evidence
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There are five attributes which influence and are influenced by the importance of
motivation. Relaxation is the first attribute which is analysed by using descriptive statistics. By
above table and graph, it can be seen that importance of relaxation increases as the age group of
tourists increases which implies a positive relationship between these two variables. This
positive relationship can be evidently proven by looking at the statistics that when the age group
is 18 – 30, the motivation level under relaxation is 2.1 but as the age group increases to 71+, the
motivation level under this attribute increases to 4.2.
This analysis in further carried using one way ANOVA in order to determine whether the
average of importance of relaxation attribute is different in each age group or not. The
descriptive statistics has shown a difference in the importance of relaxation but in order to
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