Visitor satisfaction analysis as a tool for park managers: a review and case study

Abstract

Visitor satisfaction has been an important area for leisure research since the 1960s and more recently for park management. A number of approaches have been adapted from consumer research including importance-performance analyses, gap analyses, threshold performance targets and overall satisfaction. This paper reviews these approaches with respect to park management. It then draws on focus group research with protected area agency staff to obtain their views on the usefulness and robustness of the analyses associated with these approaches. Yanchep National Park (Western Australia) was used as a case study, with the results from a recent visitor survey providing the data for satisfaction analyses. To provide a more accurate summary of the range in results, confidence intervals accompanied the results to illustrate the variation in responses. The analyses emphasize the importance for park managers of accessible, usable data on visitor satisfaction.

Keywords:

• gap analysis
• importance-performance analysis
• importance-satisfaction analysis
• national park
• park management
• satisfaction

Notes

1. SERVQUAL is a multi-item scale developed by Parasuraman, Berry and Zeitham (1988) to determine customer perceptions of service quality in service businesses.