Title: Mitigating tourism seasonality: an explanatory sequential analysis of TripAdvisor on temple experiences. A case study of Phuket

Authors: Kris Sincharoenkul; Nichapat Sangkaew

Addresses: Faculty of Hospitality and Tourism, Prince of Songkla University (Phuket Campus), Phuket, 83120, Thailand ' Faculty of Hospitality and Tourism, Prince of Songkla University (Phuket Campus), Phuket, 83120, Thailand

Abstract: Seasonality is a recurring problem affecting a weather-related destination, and cultural tourism has the potential to mitigate such a problem. Buddhist temples are famous tourist sites in Thailand that can be visited throughout the year. This paper aimed to determine the influential factors of tourists' positive experiences on their temple visits. Using the Naïve Bayes algorithm, 11,696 English reviews of 14 Buddhist temples in Phuket from the TripAdvisor website were retrieved and analysed. With a model accuracy of 70.4%, the results reported the 28 terms reflecting tourists' positive and negative experiences visiting famous temples. The content analysis of tourists' reviews based on each term found five factors influencing positive experiences: temple atmosphere, religious actions, temple integration, scenery and worthiness. Three negative factors were also found: safety, tourist expectation and external surrounding. The results are discussed, and practical implications as a suggestion for policy-making are derived.

Keywords: seasonality; cultural attractions; cultural tourism; online reviews; Phuket; temples; tourist experience; TripAdvisor; tourism development; tourist attractions.

DOI: 10.1504/IJTP.2023.130808

International Journal of Tourism Policy, 2023 Vol.13 No.3, pp.230 - 247

Received: 15 Mar 2022
Received in revised form: 11 May 2022
Accepted: 15 Jun 2022
Published online: 08 May 2023 *

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