Health, Wellness and Tourism: healthy tourists, healthy business ...

WHOQOL (WHO 2010), initiated in 1991, the Human Development Index – HDI (HDR –
UNDP 2010), introduced in 1991 or the World Database of Happiness (Veenhoven 2010). In
Portugal we can highlight three studies about municipalities, that are, in general, economic
and political approaches to tourism planning and tourism industry (Ferrão et al. 2004; Manso
et al. 2007).
Since tourism development causes changes in the territories and in host community, it brings
increasing concerns among promoters and academics about sustainability because it is
important to understand those changes. According to the World Tourism Organization (2004),
"Sustainable tourism development entails the environmental, economic and socio-cultural
aspects of tourism development, and a suitable balance between these three dimensions to
guarantee its long-term sustainability.” The involvement of residents in an impact assessment
can be useful to both forecast and appraise its more complex impacts (Dean and Wu 1979).
Moreover, most of the studies show that tourism is seen by many communities as a way to
improve residents’ quality of life and, for that reason many communities encourage tourism
development (Pizam 1978; Gursoy and Rutherford 2004; Andreck et al. 2005; Lindberg et al.
1997; Uriely 2002). However it is also recognized that this activity causes a negative impact
on destinations and among residents, particularly in economical, social and environmental
areas. As Pizam (1978) concludes there is a strong support for the hypothesis that big tourism
concentration causes negative resident attitudes towards tourists and tourism in general.
The tourism sustainable development and his relationship with residents’ attitudes is a subject
of considerable interest for many authors (Allen et al. 1988; Andreck and Vogt 2000;
Carmichael 2000; Gursoy and Rutherford 2004; Jurowski et al. 1997; Ko and Stewart 2002;
Lindberg and Johnson 1997; Perdue et al. 1987). Some of them apply in their studies the
social exchange theory (Homans, 1961) which recognized that people select exchanges after
having assessed the costs and benefits. Most of the results pointed out differences in attitudes
depending on the level of tourism development as well as a variety of other factors can
influence residents’ attitudes towards tourism.
Concerning the Social Exchange Theory and according to Turner (1986) residents who
perceive the actual or potential tourism value and believe that the costs do not exceed the
benefits will favour the exchange and will consequently be supportive of development efforts.
Skidmore (1975) also suggests that individuals will engage in exchanges if the resulting
rewards are valued, the exchange is likely to produce appreciated rewards, the perceived costs
do not exceed perceived rewards and they will consequently be supportive of development
efforts. Pizam (1978) provides also evidences to sustain this position. The same situation is
expressed in Jurowski model (1994) which demonstrates that attitudes towards tourism are
influenced by residents’ perceptions of economic, social, and environmental impacts.
According to the author, these perceptions are influenced by perceived economic gain, by the
level of use of the recreation resource, and by attitudes about humankind’s role in the
preservation of the natural environment.
Several theoretical models based on the social exchange theory have proposed explanations
for variations in resident attitudes toward tourism (Ap, 1992; Jurowski, 1994; Lindberg et al.,
1997). To quote Jurowski et. al. (1997: p.3) “the analysis demonstrate that potential for
economic gain, use of the tourism resources, ecocentric attitude, and attachment to the
community, affect resident perception of the impacts and modify both directly and indirectly,
resident support for tourism”.