Factors determining international tourist flow to tourism destinations: A systematic review

Abstract

International tourism has been growing worldwide at substantial and sustainable rates in terms of both tourist arrivals and tourism receipts. It demonstrated broad economic significance for tourism destinations around the world. This review is carried out to describe factors determining international tourist flow to international tourist destinations. The study gives insights to improve international tourist arrivals and tourism receipts at tourism destinations worldwide by providing a comprehensive summary of the results of various works of literature on international tourist flow to researchers, policy makers and practitioners. The systematic review is conducted to provide objective, replicable, systematic, and comprehensive coverage of determinants of international tourist flow. The review process comprised framing questions for review, identifying relevant works, assessing the quality of studies, summarizing the evidence, and interpreting the findings. Factors determining international tourist flow are found to be mainly related to demand factors in generating region and supply factors in destinations. Socio-cultural factors, geographical, international mobility, demographic, technological, health risk, psychological and lifestyle, and peace and security factors significantly affect international tourist flow.   Key words: Travel, tourist flow, international tourism, destination.