Sociology of Tourism - Tourism: Principles, Practices, Philosophies - page 254

communications and information environment is dominated by the mass media. The international
market is largely made up of middle-income people, including the more prosperous minority of the
working class, who normally live in large cities and earn their living in managerial, professional, white-
collar, supervisory, and skilled occupations.
There are four extremes relating to the travel preferences of international tourists : (1) complete
relaxation to constant activity, (2) traveling close to one's home environment to a totally strange
environment, (3) complete dependence on group travel to traveling alone, and (4) order to disorder.
These extremes are not completely separate, and most travelers may have any number of
combinations on any given trip. For example, a traveler may take a peaceful river cruise and then
enjoy a strenuous swim.

Relaxation versus Activity

Historically, the first wave of mass international travel occurred at a time when there was a sharp
differentiation between work and leisure and when the workweek for most people, including the
middle class, was long and exhausting. Under these circumstances, it was not surprising that the
demand concentrated on holidays that offered relaxation, recuperation, and rest. Essentially, they
provided an opportunity for winding down and getting fit for the next 49 weeks of arduous
activity. Since then, the balance between work and leisure has shifted sharply in favor of the latter.
Usually the weekend is free, and the annual holiday leave for some workers has been lengthened.
In other words, over the past decades, people have become used to greater slices of leisure time.
Relaxation is possible throughout the year, and there is less need to use a holiday exclusively for
this purpose.
With the arrival of year-round leisure, there seems to be a surfeit of opportunities for relaxation, so
that increasingly people have started to use their nonholiday leisure time to acquire and exercise
new activity skills: sailing, climbing, biking, sports, horseback riding. It is reasonable to forecast that the
balance between leisure and work will continue to move in the direction of leisure and that the relative
demand for activity-oriented travel will increase.

Familiarity versus Novelty

Most people, when they make their rst venture
abroad, tend to seek familiarity rather than novelty:
people speaking the visitors language, providing the

meals and beverages they are accustomed to, using
thesametraf c conventions, and so on. Having
found a destination where he or she feels at
home, this sort of tourist, at least for the first few
ventures abroad, will be a

'

going back
time and again to the same place. Not until more
experience is gained will the traveler want to get
away from a normal environment

'' repeater, ''

to mix with
people who speak differently, eat differently, and
dress differently.
In the Western world, the general change in
social conditions seems to be in the direction of
speeding up the readiness for novelty. Where pre-
viously the social climate and rigid structure of
society had reinforced a negative attitude to
change, we now find increasingly a positive attitude

—

A great deal of international
travel is conducted to
experience the novel. A
striking example is the
well-known floating market
in Bangkok. Photocourtesy
ofCorbisDigitalStock.