SPANISH TOURIST BEHAVIOUR. A SPECIFIC OBJECTIVE BASED SEGMENTATION

Abstract

This work uses data from the Spanish Tourism Demand Segments Survey (N=6900) conducted by the IESA-CSIC for Turismo Andaluz, SA. The objective of the paper is to develop a statistical segmentation or typology of Spanish tourists based on objective aspects of tourist behaviour measured in the survey including destinations visited, theme of the trip, lodging, transportation and travel group. Initial categorical data are reduced using multiple correspondence analysis and grouped through cluster analysis. Afterwards, identified segments are evaluated to analyse their tourist profiles with a view to examining sociological perspectives of tourist behaviour.