Revealing the pattern of causality between tourist experience and the perception of sacredness at shamanic heritage destinations in Northeast China
Abstract For religious heritage tourism, the key to a destination’s reputation lies in enabling visitors to fully experience the sacredness or a unique spiritual experience offered by the site. The authenticity of the tourism experience and perception is the most significant factor influencing visit...
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| Format: | Article |
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Nature Portfolio
2024-11-01
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| Series: | Scientific Reports |
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| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-74514-1 |
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| author | Chunhua Lin Guanqiang Wang Bing-Yu Zeng Si-Jie Li Lei Xiong Hua Yang |
| author_facet | Chunhua Lin Guanqiang Wang Bing-Yu Zeng Si-Jie Li Lei Xiong Hua Yang |
| author_sort | Chunhua Lin |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Abstract For religious heritage tourism, the key to a destination’s reputation lies in enabling visitors to fully experience the sacredness or a unique spiritual experience offered by the site. The authenticity of the tourism experience and perception is the most significant factor influencing visitors’ perception of the sacredness of religious or holy sites. However, there is currently a lack of sufficient references and evidence to explore the relationship between tourists’ authentic experiences and their perception of sacredness in religious heritage tourism. The aim of this study is to elucidate the causal relationship between the characteristics or attributes of tourists’ authentic experiences and their perception of the sacredness of the destination. Furthermore, it seeks to explore resource development and site creation strategies for religious tourism destinations to continuously enhance the sense of sacredness of these places. The Shamanic cultural traditions in the traditional settlements of Northeast China provide a subtly different context for this study. However, the topics discussed have broad applicability in constructing the network of relationships between the characteristics of tourists’ experiences and their perception of sacredness in religious heritage tourism. This study applied the causal decision analysis model based on data mining (RSA-DEMATEL) and established a causal network diagram between core attributes based on clarifying the behavioral rule knowledge (i.e., If…Then… rules) between tourists’ travel experience (conditional attributes) and the perception of place sacredness (decision-making attributes). The study finds that enhancing tourists’ perception of the sacredness of a destination is related to authentic tourism experiences, the ability to observe believers and participate in the religious activities of local residents, landscapes that reflect local traditions and historical culture, as well as the number of tourists and the extent of commercial activities. This research offers further insights into the sustainable development of religious tourism, providing a critical conceptual framework and data analysis model for subsequent related studies, contributing significantly to both theory and practice. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-87a265cc1aff4322aaa1dbbb038e93b8 |
| institution | DOAJ |
| issn | 2045-2322 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2024-11-01 |
| publisher | Nature Portfolio |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Scientific Reports |
| spelling | doaj-art-87a265cc1aff4322aaa1dbbb038e93b82025-08-20T02:50:06ZengNature PortfolioScientific Reports2045-23222024-11-0114111410.1038/s41598-024-74514-1Revealing the pattern of causality between tourist experience and the perception of sacredness at shamanic heritage destinations in Northeast ChinaChunhua Lin0Guanqiang Wang1Bing-Yu Zeng2Si-Jie Li3Lei Xiong4Hua Yang5School of Art/Pearl River Film Academy, Jinan UniversityFaculty of Humanities and Arts, Macau University of Science and TechnologyThe Institute of Fine Arts, South China Normal UniversityFaculty of Humanities and Arts, Macau University of Science and TechnologySchool of Architecture, Art and Design, Guangzhou Academy of Fine ArtsHubei Institute of Fine ArtsAbstract For religious heritage tourism, the key to a destination’s reputation lies in enabling visitors to fully experience the sacredness or a unique spiritual experience offered by the site. The authenticity of the tourism experience and perception is the most significant factor influencing visitors’ perception of the sacredness of religious or holy sites. However, there is currently a lack of sufficient references and evidence to explore the relationship between tourists’ authentic experiences and their perception of sacredness in religious heritage tourism. The aim of this study is to elucidate the causal relationship between the characteristics or attributes of tourists’ authentic experiences and their perception of the sacredness of the destination. Furthermore, it seeks to explore resource development and site creation strategies for religious tourism destinations to continuously enhance the sense of sacredness of these places. The Shamanic cultural traditions in the traditional settlements of Northeast China provide a subtly different context for this study. However, the topics discussed have broad applicability in constructing the network of relationships between the characteristics of tourists’ experiences and their perception of sacredness in religious heritage tourism. This study applied the causal decision analysis model based on data mining (RSA-DEMATEL) and established a causal network diagram between core attributes based on clarifying the behavioral rule knowledge (i.e., If…Then… rules) between tourists’ travel experience (conditional attributes) and the perception of place sacredness (decision-making attributes). The study finds that enhancing tourists’ perception of the sacredness of a destination is related to authentic tourism experiences, the ability to observe believers and participate in the religious activities of local residents, landscapes that reflect local traditions and historical culture, as well as the number of tourists and the extent of commercial activities. This research offers further insights into the sustainable development of religious tourism, providing a critical conceptual framework and data analysis model for subsequent related studies, contributing significantly to both theory and practice.https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-74514-1Shamanic heritage destinationsSacrednessAuthentic experienceCultural tourismRSA-DEMATEL model |
| spellingShingle | Chunhua Lin Guanqiang Wang Bing-Yu Zeng Si-Jie Li Lei Xiong Hua Yang Revealing the pattern of causality between tourist experience and the perception of sacredness at shamanic heritage destinations in Northeast China Scientific Reports Shamanic heritage destinations Sacredness Authentic experience Cultural tourism RSA-DEMATEL model |
| title | Revealing the pattern of causality between tourist experience and the perception of sacredness at shamanic heritage destinations in Northeast China |
| title_full | Revealing the pattern of causality between tourist experience and the perception of sacredness at shamanic heritage destinations in Northeast China |
| title_fullStr | Revealing the pattern of causality between tourist experience and the perception of sacredness at shamanic heritage destinations in Northeast China |
| title_full_unstemmed | Revealing the pattern of causality between tourist experience and the perception of sacredness at shamanic heritage destinations in Northeast China |
| title_short | Revealing the pattern of causality between tourist experience and the perception of sacredness at shamanic heritage destinations in Northeast China |
| title_sort | revealing the pattern of causality between tourist experience and the perception of sacredness at shamanic heritage destinations in northeast china |
| topic | Shamanic heritage destinations Sacredness Authentic experience Cultural tourism RSA-DEMATEL model |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-74514-1 |
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