Abstract:

The aim of this study is to explore the tourism perspective of the local people. There were 395 people living in Sanliurfa. The survey consists of 9 demographic and 42 attitude questions. In the analysis of the factor, the attitude questions were reduced to seven different dimensions. The seven dimensions consist of the full participation of the public in the decisions relating to tourism, the social cost of tourism, the long-term planning in tourism, the satisfaction of visitors, the community-centered economy, the environmental sustainability, the social cost of tourism. According to the results obtained, the personal characteristics of local development (gender, education, age, professional income, civic status) and attitudes they show against certain dimensions are different. Also there was no meaningful relationship between the environmental sustainability size and the participant’s residence periods in the province of Sanlıurfa and their attitude points. With the participants earning income from tourism, there has been a statistically significant difference in the size of social cost of tourism only. With the participants going on holiday, a significant difference has been achieved for the size of the economic benefit of tourism only. * This study is produced from the master's thesis of Meltem TANBURACI.

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