Page 1 of 5
Journal for Studies in Management and Planning
Available at
http://edupediapublications.org/journals/index.php/JSMaP/
e-ISSN: 2395-0463
Volume 02 Issue 9
September 2016
Available online: http://edupediapublications.org/journals/index.php/JSMaP/ P a g e | 86
Resident’s Perceptions of Quality Of Life in Tourism
destination of Passikudah in Batticaloa District
Mrs.S.Maheswaranathan
Senior Lecturer, Department of Economics, Faculty of Commerce and Management, Eastern
University, Sri Lanka.
ABSTRACT
Tourism development is increasingly viewed as an
important tool in promoting economic growth, alleviating
poverty, and advancing food security. Also the tourism
industry develops hotel accommodation, railways,
waterways, roads, highway, electricity, supply of water,
and other facilities like restaurants and shopping etc.
Therefore tourism contributes to the GDP; create
employment opportunity and earning foreign exchange.
The Government of Sri Lanka has recognized tourism as
an important sector, having the potential to contribute
considerably to the country's post-war economic
development. Therefore the studies intend the perception
of tourism on their Quality Of Life among the people who
live in Passikudah tourist area. Using convenience
sampling method structured questionnaire was
administered to the 100 respondents from the study area
of Passikkudah in Batticaloa district. To measure
perceived quality of life of tourism, recreation amenities,
community pride and awareness, economic strength,
natural/cultural preservation, community well-being, way
of life, crime and substance abuse, and urban issues were
considered as variable for this study. The main findings of
the study is the six variables such as economic strength,
community pride and awareness, natural/cultural
preservation, community well-being, recreation amenities
and way of life indicates the high level of perception about
their quality of life. Further, crime and substance abuse,
and urban issues have no significant impact on the quality
of life of people in this study area.
Keywords: Quality of life, Tourism, Perception,
Economic Strength, Economic development
1. Introduction
Tourism becomes one of the vital sectors in
economic progress and poverty reduction also it has
been a source of social-economic change in many
developing countries. It also stimulates the
development of basic infrastructure through the
construction of roads, port and airport facilities and
the provision of financial services from which the
economy as a whole can benefit. The Sri Lankan
government identified tourism as a major hub of the
country’s economy. It has earned US$1.8 billion
revenue 3.9 percent of contribution to GDP and 3.5
percent of people directly employed under the
tourism sector in 2013(Central Bank, 2012).
Tourism comes in many shapes and forms such as
social, cultural, economic and environmental
(Godfrey & Clarke, 2000). Therefore, the quality of
life of the residents should be a major concern for
community leaders. Numerous studies have
examined local residents’ perceptions of the
economic, social, cultural and environmental
impacts of tourism (Aref, 2010).Tourism growth
provides significant economic benefits such as
creating employment and additional income in both
host countries and tourists’ home countries
(Delibasic et al., 2008). It is also an industry that has
many environmental and social consequences. Few
have addressed the effect of tourism on enhancing
the quality of life (Cohen, 1978; Gursoy, Jurowski,
&Uysal, 2002; Jurowski, Uysal, & Williams, 1997;
Kim, 2002; Linton, 1987; Richard R. Perdue, Long,
& Kang, 1999).
There are many ways in which tourism may
influence an individual’s QOL. An improved QOL
can be seen through the development of tourism
products that can also be enjoyed by residents, such
as festivals, restaurants, natural and cultural
attractions, and outdoor recreation opportunities. An
improved QOL can also be seen through a higher
personal standard of living through job creation and
increased tax revenues that in turn result in services
to residents, for example. Alternatively, tourism can
result in negative QOL impacts such as crowding,
traffic and parking problems, increased crime, and
increased cost of living, friction between tourists
and residents, and changes in residents’ way of life,
all of which can be detrimental to life satisfaction
(Ap and Crompton 1993; Bastias-Perez and Var
1995; McCool and Martin 1994; Ross 1992;
Tooman 1997).
Page 2 of 5
Journal for Studies in Management and Planning
Available at
http://edupediapublications.org/journals/index.php/JSMaP/
e-ISSN: 2395-0463
Volume 02 Issue 9
September 2016
Available online: http://edupediapublications.org/journals/index.php/JSMaP/ P a g e | 87
2. Problem Statement and Objectives of the
Study
Tourism is often viewed as an expression of human
behavior (Kim, 2002). Tourism is the set of ideas,
theories, or ideologies for being a tourist, and that it
is the behavior of people in tourist roles, when these
ideas are put into practice (Przeclawski, 1986). Once
a community becomes a destination, the lives of
residents in the community are affected by tourism,
and the support of the residents is essential for the
development, planning, successful operation and
sustainability of tourism (Kim, 2002).
It is lack of literature in Sri Lanka to examine,
investigated residents’ perception of the tourism has
on their quality of life (QOL) of Passikudah tourist
area, because the Post war situation lead path to local
places for tourist attractions. And the people who
live in this areas also get benefit provide local
transportation, communication, hotel and food,
shopping and entertainment for the tourist as well as
residents. Therefore, this study tries to investigate
the perception of tourism on the Quality Of Life
(QOL) among the people who live in Passikudah.
For the study purpose the following research
questions are formulated.
What is the level of recreation amenities?
Examine the level of community pride
and awareness?
Identify the level of economic strength?
Examine the level of community well- being?
Identify the level of way of life?
Identify the level of urban issues?
Identify the level of Natural/cultural
preservation?
Examine the level of Crime and
substance abuse?
3. Literature Review
Tourism is a multifarious industry. It helps to
economic such as employment opportunities and tax
revenues, infrastructure development, and also
increase the quality of life.
(Delibasic et al., 2008), Tourism growth provides
significant economic benefits such as creating
employment and additional income in both host
countries and tourists’ home countries.
(Honey & Gilpin, 2009) fond in their study although
the potential benefits of tourism development have
been well documented, tourism has also been
associated with negative impacts, for example as a
delivery mechanism for health pandemics and
terrorism.
According to Constanţa (2009) tourism can increase
quality of life, which is carried out in various forms:
rest, relaxation, recreation, maintenance of tone,
knowledge development and sense o
Perdue, Long and Gustke (1991) analyzed the
relationship between tourism and quality of life of
local citizen. They concluded that tourism has an
influence on type of employment, cost and quality
of education and health services provision. These
findings reveled that tourism has the positive effect
on quality of life (well-being) of rural populations.
In a study of rural tourism impact, Crotts and
Holland (1993) concluded that tourism affects
positively the quality of life of rural residents in
terms of income, health, recreation, personal
services and per capita sales, and negatively the
level of poverty.
Researchers have also asked residents if they felt
that tourism improved the economy (Allen et al.,
1988; Bradley et al., 1989; Ritchie, 1988), provided
an improved standard of living (Belisle & Holy,
1980; Tosun, 2002; Um & Crompton, 1990),
increased investment (Liu et al., 1987) and more
business activity (Prentice, 1993). The findings of
these studies suggest that residents perceive an
improvement in income, standard of living,
investments and business activities ensuing from
tourism activities. Liu and Var (1986) reported in his
study that 90% of the residents in Hawaii agreed that
tourism brought the community more investment
and local business.
Page 3 of 5
Journal for Studies in Management and Planning
Available at
http://edupediapublications.org/journals/index.php/JSMaP/
e-ISSN: 2395-0463
Volume 02 Issue 9
September 2016
Available online: http://edupediapublications.org/journals/index.php/JSMaP/ P a g e | 88
4. Conceptual Framework
Basedon literature survey the following conceptual framework has been developed. This conceptual framework
establishes link between dependent and independent variables.
Sources: - Kathleen et.al, (2010) with some modification
5. Research Methodology
This study was carried out in tourism destinations in
Passikudah in Batticaloa District to investigate the
perception of tourism on the Quality Of Life (QOL)
of the people who live in study area. To achieve the
objectives of this study it uses questionnaire survey
through 00 residents in the communities. The
questionnaire was structured around a Likert scale.
Each statement was situated on a five scales with 1
representing a response of “strongly disagree” and 5
representing “strongly agree”. A face to face onsite
self-administered survey was conducted using the
convenience sampling method. Convenience
sampling methods has been widely used by almost
all the major public opinion polling groups, political
groups and market research organization (Deng et
al., 2010). Eight variables that are presented for
measurement the quality of life which adopted from
various literature.
5.1 Method of Data Presentation and Data
Analysis
Based on the Univariate establishment of each
variable in the conceptual frame work, both
independent and dependent have been arrived. This
study going to use five point Likert’s scales
questionnaire. Therefore this study formulate three
decisions that can be derived from the value
indicated in the question between 1-5 scale as
follows, answers for this study will have fall into
these range and convey the meaning to respective
stake holders.
Community
awareness
Well-Being
Economic strength
Way of life
Urban issues
Natural/Cultural
preservation
Crime and substance
abuse
Recreation amenities
Quality of Life
