Sustainability, Vol. 12, Pages 2508: The Spatial Distribution, Influencing Factors, and Development Path of Inbound Tourism in China--An Empirical Analysis of Market Segments Based on Travel Motivation (Sustainability)

According to China’s tourism statistics, the inbound tourism market is composed of eight types of travel motivations (sightseeing, leisure, business meeting (business-m), visiting relatives and friends (visiting-rf), shopping, religious worship (religious-w), culture and sports (culture-s), and health care (health-c)), and the spatial distribution of each type of travel motivation is significantly different. Four inbound sub-markets (foreigners, Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan) were selected as our research object. Through empirical analysis of the variable elasticity of eight different inbound motive market segments, we found that the sensitivities (elasticity) of the influencing factors (traffic conditions (traffic-c), destination image (destination-i), industry structure (industry-s), infrastructure, consumer price index (CPI), resource endowment (resource-e), and dressing index (ICL)) are different. Therefore, investment options in the target market can have differential treatment based on the rate of marginal return on investment. In accordance with the characteristics of different market segments, we suggest more feasible development paths and countermeasures, providing a decision-making basis for the accurate development of the inbound tourism market.