Abstract
Place attachment is an important motivation for people to spend more time outdoors and to protect landscapes. This study explores visitors’ intention to conserve natural landscapes based on the relationship with their place attachment to National Park landscape. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to determine the relationship between landscape conservation and place attachment. A survey with a structured questionnaire was administered to visitors to the seven designated hiking courses of Harz National Park in Germany. The path coefficient of 0.77 revealed that place dependence positively and significantly affected place attachment, whereas place identity did not. Place attachment had a significant effect on both affective appraisals and visiting satisfaction. Higher place attachment led to higher emotional reaction to landscapes on site and higher satisfaction of visiting the park. Among the variables, visiting satisfaction, but not affective appraisals, played a statistically significant mediating role between place attachment and conservation intention. With a path coefficient of 0.86, conservation intention was highly affected by visiting satisfaction. These results suggest that the managers of National Parks should focus on increasing visiting satisfaction based on how visitors are emotionally bonded with their visiting places, in order to enhance the intentions to conserve the landscape of the visitors to National Parks.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Andkjaer S, Arvidsen J (2015) Places for active outdoor recreation–A sco** review. Journal of Outdoor Recreation and Tourism 12: 25–46. DOI: 10.1016/j.jort.2015.10.001
Beery T, Jönsson IK (2017) Outdoor recreation and place attachment: Exploring the potential of outdoor recreation within a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. Journal of Outdoor Recreation and Tourism 17: 54–63. DOI: 10.1016/j.jort.2017. 01.002
Bosque IR, Martin HS (2008) Tourist Satisfaction: A cognitiveaffective Model. Annals of Tourism Research 35(2): 551–573. DOI: 10.1016/j.annals.2008.02.006
Bricker KS, Kerstetter DL (2000) Level of specialization and place attachment: An exploratory study of whitewater recreationists. Leisure Science 22: 233–257. DOI: 10.1080/01490409950202285
Brown G, Raymond C (2007) The relationship between place attachment and landscape values: Toward map** place attachment. Applied Geography 27: 89–111. DOI: 10.1016/j.apgeog.2006.11.002
Gosling E, Williams JHK (2010) Connectedness to nature, place attachment and conservation behaviour: Testing connectedness theory among farmers. Journal of Environmental Psychology 30(3): 298–304. DOI: 10.1016/j.jenvp.2010.01.005
Hay R (1998) Sense of place in developmental context. Journal of Environmental Psychology 18: 5–29. DOI: 10.1006/jevp. 1997.0060
Hwang S, Lee C, Chen H (2005) The relationship among tourists’ involvement, place attachment and interpretation satisfaction in Taiwan’s national parks. Tourism Management 26(2): 143–156. DOI: 10.1016/j.tourman.2003.11.006
Kaltenborn PB, Bjerke T (2002) Association between Landscape Preferences and place attachment: A study in Roros, Southern Norway. Landscape Research 27(4): 381–396. DOI: 10.1080/0142639022000023943
Knapp HL, Nelle O, Kirleis W (2015) Chargoal usage in medieval and modern times in the Harz Mountains Area, Central Germany: Wood selection and fast overexploitation of the woodlands. Quaternary International 366: 51–69. DOI: 10.1016/j.quaint.2015.01.053
Kyle G, Graefe AR, Manning R, Bacon J (2003) An examination of the relationship between leisure activity involvement and place attachment among hikers along the Appalachian Trail. Journal of Leisure Research 35(3): 249–273.
Kyle G, Greafe A, Manning R, Bacon J (2004) Effects of place attachment on user's perceptions of social and environmental conditions in a natural setting. Journal of Environmental Psychology 24(2): 213–225. DOI: 10.1016/j.jenvp.2003.12.006
Lee JH, Lee D (2015) Nature experience, recreation activity and health benefits of visitors in mountain and urban forests in Vienna, Zurich and Freiburg. Journal of Mountain Science 12(6): 1551–1561. DOI: 10.1007/s11629-014-3246-3
Lupp G, Konold W, Bastian O (2013) Landscape management and landscape changes towards more naturalness and wilderness: Effects on scenic qualities–The case of the Müritz National Park in Germany. Journal for Nature Conservation 21: 10–21. DOI: 10.1016/j.jnc.2012.08.003
Moore RL, Graefe AR (1994) Attachments to recreation settings: The case of rail-trail users. Leisure Sciences 14: 3–16. DOI: 10.1080/01490409409513214
Motoyama Y, Hanyu K (2014) Does public art enrich landscapes? The effect of public art on visual properties and affective appraisals of landscapes. Journal of Environmental Psychology 40: 14–25. DOI: 10.1016/j.jenvp.2014.04.008
Nationalpark Harz (2015) http://www.nationalpark-harz.de/
Ramkissoon H, Smith GDL, Weiler B (2013) Testing the dimensionality of place attachment and its relationships with place satisfaction and pro-environmental behaviours: A structural equation modelling approach. Tourism Management 36: 552–566. DOI: 10.1016/j.tourman.2012.09.003
Raymond MC, Brown G, Robinson MG (2011) The influence of place attachment, and moral and normative concerns on the conservation of native vegetation: A test of two behavioural models. Journal of Environmental Psychology 31(4): 323–335. DOI: 10.1016/j.jenvp.2011.08.006
Patterson EM, Williams RD (2005) Maintaining research traditions on place: Diversity of thought and scientific progress. Journal of Environmental Psychology 25: 361–380. DOI: 10.1016/j.jenvp.2005.10.001
Stedman R, Beckley T, Wallace S, Ambard M (2004) A picture and 1000 words: using resident-employed photography to understand attachment to high amenity places. Journal of Leisure Research 36(4): 580–606.
Stedman RC (2006) Understanding place attachment among second home owners. American Behavioral Science 50(2): 187–205. DOI: 10.1177/0002764206290633
Twigger-Ross LC, Uzzell LD (1996) Place and identity processes. Journal of Environmental Psychology 16: 205–220. DOI: 10.1006/jevp.1996.0017
Walker JA, Ryan LR (2008) Place attachment and landscape preservation in rural New England: A Maine case study. Landscape and Urban Planning 86(2): 141–152. DOI: 10.1016/j.landurbplan.2008.02.001
Wikimedia commons (2015) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/
Williams DR, Patterson ME, Roggenbuck JW, Watson AE (1992) Beyond the commodity metaphor: Examining emotional and symbolic attachment to place. Leisure Sciences 14: 29–46. DOI: 10.1080/01490409209513155
Williams DR, Vaske JJ (2003) The measurement of place attachment: Validity and generalizability of a psychometric approach. Forest Science 49(6): 830–840.
Xu F, Fox D (2014) Modelling attitudes to nature, tourism and sustainable development in national parks: A survey of visitors in China and the UK. Tourism Management 45: 142–158. DOI: 10.1016/j.tourman.2014.03.005
Yoon Y, Uysal M (2005) An examination of the effects of motivation and satisfaction on destination loyalty: a structural model. Tourism Management 26: 45–56. DOI: 10.1016/j.tourman.2003.08.016
Yuksel A, Yuksel F, Bilim Y (2010) Destination attachment: Effects on customer satisfaction and cognitive, affective and conative loyalty. Tourism Management 31(2): 274–284. DOI: 10.1016/j.tourman.2009.03.007
Zhang H, Lin SH (2011) Affective appraisal of residents and visual elements in the neighborhood: A case study in an established suburban community. Landscape Urban Planning 101: 11–21. DOI: 10.1016/j.landurbplan.2010.12.010
Zia A, Norton GB, Metcalf SS, Hirsch DP, Hannon MB (2014) Spatial discounting, place attachment, and environmental concern: Toward an ambit-based theory of sense of place. Journal of Environmental Psychology 40: 283–295. DOI: 10.1016/j.jenvp.2014.08.001
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea Grant funded by the Korean Government (NRF-2015-013-20150012).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0514-1414
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5614-8851
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Lee, D., Lee, JH. A structural relationship between place attachment and intention to conserve landscapes – a case study of Harz National Park in Germany. J. Mt. Sci. 14, 998–1007 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11629-017-4366-3
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11629-017-4366-3