A Study on Residents’ Perceptions Towards Tourism Development in Arugambay

Abstract

With the -pandemic, Sri Lanka has to promote tourism to attract more tourists to the destinations and gain high foreign exchange. So, residents’ perception of tourism development is crucial for that. Therefore the purpose of this study was to explore “factors affecting residents’ perception toward tourism development in Arugambay” by highlighting the three major independent analysis factors, including community attachment, residents' involvement, level of knowledge and also residents’ perception of tourism development was considered as a mediate variable and dependent variable which is named as residents’ support for tourism development. a framework based on social exchange theory (SET) was developed to conceptualise these relationships. The relationship between independent variables and dependent variable were powerful. Therefore results of the study suggest that perceptions strongly influence support for tourism development in Arugambay. This study used a quantitative research design and a quantitative research approach used as a methodology. The close-ended questionnaire was distributed during the covid-19 pandemic situation with 50 samples selected from residents in the Arugambay on convenience sampling. The data was analysed by using SPSS version 25. In general, according to the mean value, Arugambay’s residents had a higher positive perception of tourism development in their community. Correlation analysis illustrated that the residents’ perceptions about tourism development were positively and significantly correlated with support for tourism development. Researchers have recommended that residents in the area could be directed to further involvement in the industry by emphasising on future opportunities might available in the tourism field to obtain their support in the development of the tourism activities in the area.