Chapter 8: Gender Differences: Perceived Tourism Impacts and Tourism Development Support

Given that tourism generates impacts that can be either positive or negative and that it can potentially influence both the standard and the way of living of the host community (Andereck & Nyaupane,, 2011), there is a growing number of authors who are investigating tourism development, the residents' perceptions of its impacts and the level of their support. This is important particularly in terms of the destination sustainability in the long run, it is imperative that destination management ensure residents' support. Destination managers and developers should understand what factors influence residents' level of support since in that way they will be able to use that knowledge in motivating them to be more active and supportive. In that way, they can facilitate sustainable tourism development given that destination sustainability depends heavily on the active participation of residents (Dwyer, Forsyth, & Spurr, 2004; Yoon, Gursoy, & Chen, 2001). Therefore, a rich body of literature is focused on the previous mentioned issues regarding the host community point of view when it comes to the tourism and its impacts on the residents and community, in general (i.e. Gursoy, Jurowski, & Uysal, 2002; McGehee & Andereck, 2004; Ramseook-Munhurrun & Naidoo, 2011; Soldić Frleta & Đurkin Badurina, 2019; Stylidis, Biran, Sit, & Szivas, 2014; Yoon et al., 2001). In that context, as Teye, Sirakaya, & Sönmez (2002) confirmed, many authors have developed different models in order to investigate residents' perceptions towards tourism impacts. Choi and Murray (2010) found that authors included models and theories like the Doxey's (1975) Irridex model; the Butler's (1980) destination life cycle model; the dependency theory (Britton, 1989); the social representation theory (Madrigal, 1993; Pearce, Moscardo & Ross, 1996); attribution (Pearce, 1989); value–attitude models (Lindberg & Johnson, 1997; Madrigal, 1995); and others. However, one of the most tested models is the one referring to the social exchange theory (SET) (Ap, 1990, 1992). According to this theory, attitudes of the residents when it comes further tourism development are seen as a balance between their perceived benefits and costs generated by tourism (Zhang, Inbakaran, & Jackson, 2006), whereby residents engaged in the exchange interaction are seeking to maximise their benefits and minimise their costs (Choi & Murray, 2010). In that context, SET has become a very helpful and widely used theory in explaining residents' behaviour towards tourism development (Choi & Murray, 2010). Given the fact that SET has been criticised due to its simplicity (Sharpley,, 2014), many researchers (e.g. McGehee & Andereck, 2004; Rasoolimanesh, Jaafar, Kock, & Ramayah, 2015; Stylidis et al., 2014; Vargas-Sánchez, Porras-Bueno, & de los Ángeles Plaza-Mejía, 2011) have developed more complex models by adding additional variables to their models (i.e. socio-demographic variables, tourism life cycle stage, tourism dependency, community attachment; residents' place image, etc.). For instance, Haralambopoulos and Pizam (1996) reported that locals sometimes perceive tourism impacts to be more positive because they are economically depending on tourism and benefiting from tourism. This often leads to an increased degree of their support to tourism development. Moreover, many authors have identified that as the greater residents' perceived personal tourism benefits, the smaller are their perceived negative tourism generated impacts and the greater is their support for future development of tourism (McGehee & Andereck,, 2004; Ritchie & Inkari, 2006; Wang & Pfister, 2008). In that context, it is necessary to understand are there any differences in perceived tourism impacts and consequently, differences in factors affecting the support level between different groups of residents. Meimand et al. (2017) underline that the majority of previous studies dealing with tourism development residents' support and their attitudes regarding tourism impacts were done in the initial phase of a given destination's development. This study, on the contrary, focuses on Croatian destinations that have a long tourism tradition and whose residents have long experience in encountering and hosting large numbers of tourists. Moreover, Croatia is specific in terms of its accommodation facilities given the fact that more than 50% of the total number of available rooms and apartments is clustered in private accommodation (Croatian Bureau of Statistics (CBS), 2020). In 2019, 19.6 million tourist arrivals were registered in Croatia, and they realised 91.2 million overnight stays. Compared with 2018, tourist arrivals increased by 4.8% and overnights by 1.8%. Foreign tourists accounted for 92.2% of overnights in 2019. Tourists from Germany were the most numerous (16.6% of total foreign tourist arrivals), followed by tourists from Slovenia (8.9%) and Austria (8.4%). According to the CBS (2020), the group ‘Holiday and other short-stay accommodation’ (which comprises private accommodation provided by residents) accounted for the most tourist nights in 2019, as many as 46.1 million or 50.5% of the total number of tourist nights. This is evidence of the great involvement of residents who are renting their rooms, apartments, houses or villas, and gaining direct economic benefits from tourism. However, since the most of the tourism traffic in Croatia takes place during the summer season and on the Adriatic coast, some negative impacts of tourism are emerging (i.e. overcrowded city centres, beaches and other public spaces, noise, visual degradation of space and other impacts generated by high seasonality) that are affecting the quality of life. For that reason, as well as due to the residents' important role in tourism development, there is the need to find out their point of view regarding the current state of tourism in their community and its development prospects.