Almost there...

5 more days until submission day... My research journey has been very intense lately, but as an outcome my research proposal takes form now. I completed the literature review part and am now working on the methodology part. This presents a particular challenge for me, but I must say that through searching the literature and other studies published in journals I learned a lot and have a quite clear picture now of how my research will look like. The challenge is now to put this in words...
After submitting the research proposal on monday I will publish my final version also here on my blog. I hope the one or other will be interested in further following my research. The journey will continue until the end of september...

Today, I also prepared and submitted my ethical compliance form. Since I do not intend to involve human participants in my research, I am confident that I will pass this barrier without any problems. However, I reserve the right to additionally conduct interviews in case that the data that I will collect from websites won't be sufficient. Anyway, this should not hinder my research since neither people considered as vulnerable nor personal data will be involved.

Looking forward to completing my proposal and being able to start with the collection of data! Before, however, I will treat myself to some rest :-)

Change of direction

After the first meeting with my supervisor, my research project will now follow a slightly different direction. The overall question - how group package tours fit into the idea of special interest tourism - remains, however, I will take now a different approach in trying to answer this question, not focusing anymore on tourist motivation.

My supervisor agreed with me that it may be difficult, if not impossible, to get access to the customers of special interest tour operators. Therefore, she suggested to make a content analysis of travel brochures and operators' websites to find out how suppliers communicate the uniquesness of the product despite of the standardisation of the group package tour to its customers. Additionally, I may carry out interviews with suppliers of special interest group package tours.
To narrow my topic, I can focus on sit tours to Brazil organized by German tour operators. If there are not enough, I may reconsider more destinations or outgoing markets.

To sum up, my research will focus now on the supply-side rather than the demand-side as I was unsure about from the beginning of my proposal. Although I first preferred to analyse the demand-side, I am now really happy with the turn and can 'see the research in my mind's eye' :-)

My draft research proposal - project title and objectives. Methodology?

After carrying out further literature research and exchanging ideas with various people, I finally was able to formulate my draft research proposal. And here it is:

Proposed Project Title/Broad Question:

Group package tours within a special interest tourism context: a contradiction?

An exploratory investigation of the motivations and determinants of decision-making of German participants of a special interest group package tour to Brazil.

Research Objectives/ Questions/ Hypothesis:

The literature suggests that special interest tourism is the provision of customised experiences driven by the primary motivation of a special interest which can include activities, themes or destinations. The special interest tourist is described as the ‘new’ tourist who seeks individualised, unique, authentic, novel, meaningful and participatory experiences and immersion in the culture and physical environment of the host communities.

In contrast, a group package tour (GPT) tends to offers little flexibility and interaction with local culture.

This raises the question how group package tours fit into the idea of special interest tourism?

Not much research is carried out in the field of long-haul outbound group package tours. Interestingly, studies in Asia indicate that the itinerary of the tour is not a significant travel motive and determinant of decision-making, but price, right-timing, safety, convenience, recommendation from friends and reputation of the operator.

This seems to contradict with the idea of special interest tourism.

Since the existing research in this field concentrate on the Asian market, I am curious if an investigation upon German participants of a claimed special interest group package tour will lead to the same results.

The objectives of this research are to identify:

·         who participates a special interest group package tour,

·         what motivates them,

·         why they join a group tour and travel not as FIT and

·         how they choose the operator and package, what are their selection criteria.

Based upon these, the overall questions, if group package tours contradict the idea of special interest tourism and if they can fulfil the needs of the postmodern, ‘new’ tourists, will be answered.

What I am not so sure about yet, is the research approach and methodologies I will use in order to achieve my objectives. I have concerns about the accessibility of information and informants. Tour operators need to give me access to their data and provide contact to their customers. As an alternative I could participate at a tour, but since group tour departures are generally depending on group size and thus not guaranteed, this approach might also be problematic. 

What do YOU think? Maybe you have some experience in research and could give me some advice.

I would love to hear your opinion!

Research proposal

Time is running so fast. I have the impression I just started yesterday my MA in International Tourism Management at the University of Greenwich and now I have to come up already with a topic for my dissertation...
My field of interest is special interest tourism and I have a preference for the destination Brazil. Since my future career aspiration is to work for a specialist tour operator in Europe offering Brazil tour packages for FIT or groups, I would like to focus my research on this topic. I decided to concentrate on group package tours, because I have the impression that not much research is done in this specific area. However, I am not sure yet, whether I would like to analyse the demand-side to identify who participate in group package tours to Brazil and what motivates them, or the supply-side regarding the existing offers and the process and criteria of packaging such a tour and develop an itinerary?!
What do you think? I would love to hear your opinion and am grateful for every advice and idea!