Intention to Visit Religious Sites in Sakonnakorn Province Among Thai Travelers Post COVID-19

Abstract

The study aimed to (1) analyze religious tourism motive components and (2) investigate the relationship and impact of the components on the intention to visit religious sites in Sakonnakorn Province after COVID-19. The study was based on a quantitative response of 385 Thai travelers selected with convenient sampling. A questionnaire was used to collect data and Factor Analysis and Multiple Regression Analysis techniques were applied to test the statistical significance across the independent and dependent variables and the research hypothesis. The findings indicate that most Thai travelers rated very highly the importance of all factors of religious motive and intention to visit the religious sites for all items, and at the same time, they have highly expected for all the religious tourism attributes in Sakhonnakorn. Significantly, two components of (1) religious spirituality, heritage, and culture and (2) distinguished attractions with word-of-mouth were found to be the most important powerful variables affecting Thai travelers’ intention to visit the religious sites, whereas the component of value for money of a travel plan has no impact on the travelers’ intention at the statistically significant level of .05.