Pleasure travel (tourist) motivation: A factor analytic approach

Abstract

The major motives underlying pleasure travel were investigated by factor-analyzing Figler’s Travel Motivation Survey, which is based on a variety of motives for pleasure travel suggested in the tourism literature. This questionnaire was administered to 325 subjects. The data analysis uncovered five orthogonal factors, which together accounted for 46.6% of the total response variance. The five factors, as well as the percentage of variance accounted for by each one, were as follows: anomie/authenticity-seeking (20.1%), culture/education (9.6%), escape/regression (7.4%), wanderlust/exploring the unknown (5.1%), and jetsetting/prestige-seeking (4.4%). The test-retest reliability of each factor was also established. These data empirically support some of the notions proposed in previous travel literature, although past studies have usually focused on only a few motives, have been nonquantified, and/or have not provided data on the relative importance of each motive. The present data quantitatively revealed a hierarchy of independent motives underlying pleasure travel. © 1992, Psychonomic Society, Inc.. All rights reserved.