RESIDENTS' ATTITUDES TO TOURISM DEVELOPMENT IN ANCIENT VILLAGE RESORTS——Case Study of World Cultural Heritage of Xidi and Hong Villages

Tourism development surely has social, economic and environmental impacts on tourist destinations.The study on resorts residents' attitudes can help understand the nature of tourism development and the extent to which it may influence on tourist destinations. By now, researches on residents' perception and attitudes are plenteous in the international circle and achievements are great, yet few are found in developing countries. As a most representative cultural tourist destination, World Cultural Heritage-Xidi and Hong villages in Yi County of Anhui Province, are drawing the attention of both tourists and academic circles. This article, taking Xidi and Hong villages as examples, seeks to analyze ancient village residents' attitudes towards tourism impacts and then tries further to explore the connection between tourism development and residents' attitudes. Both qualitative and quantitative surveys are applied in the exploratory investigation into local residents' attitudes of tourism impacts. Based on abundant face-to-face interviews with the local households, tourism enterprises concerned, local government and tourists from July to August of 2002, we are able to have a better understanding of local residents' attitudes to community life, and perception of tourism impacts on society, economy and environment. By this we can promote domestic study on resorts residents' attitudes, and provide some theoretical grounds for establishing tourism development planning and perfect community participation system at tourist destinations.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN RESORT LIFE CYCLE AND RESIDENTS' PERCEPTION AND ATTITUDE——A Case Study of Putuo Mountain

The change in residents′ perception and attitude and resort life cycle are the basic problems in the course of resort evolution. This thesis sets up the dynamic model of residents′perception and attitude, analyzes the linkage between residents′ perception and attitude and the influential factors of resort life cycle, and finally, with a case study of Putuo Mountain, preliminarily discusses the relationship between resort life cycle and residents′perception and attitude. The research findings show that, although within development stage of life cycle, Putuo Mountain has already presented some signs of mature stage. The on-the-spot survey also indicates that, the local residents′ positive perception is stronger than their negative perception. But compared with residents in some other coastal resorts such as Haikou and Sanya, negative perception of residents in Putuo Mountain is more evident, as the result of the smaller tourism carrying capacity in Putuo Mountain. There are some influential factors that have great impact on tourism carrying capacity in Putuo Mountain: tourist-resident number ratio, residents′ benefit-cost ratio and characteristics of tourism resources. And the less influential factors are residents′ demographic character, tourist behavioral character and cultural differences between local residents and tourists. Therefore, effective measures should be taken to adjust the structure of tourism product for the purpose of expanding tourism carrying capacity, lowering its pressure, lessening residents′ environmental cost and enhancing their positive perception, which is the most essential prerequisite for the maturation of life cycle in Putuo Mountain.