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Climate change is a global crisis exacerbated by human activity and a matter of urgent concern. There is a significant knowledge gap among primary school students in Serbia, as the topic of climate change is barely covered in the curriculum. This study examines their awareness, knowledge and attitudes. Of the participants, 96.6% are aware of climate change, but their knowledge and attitudes vary considerably. Some 80.10% expect climate change to have a significant impact on humans through floods (90%), droughts and temperature increases (85% each). Further results show that schools are a key source of information (35.10%), followed by television (30.10%) and the internet (14.90%). In summary, this study highlights the need for comprehensive, multidisciplinary climate education to address different levels of awareness, encourage informed and proactive responses and engage young voices in discussions about climate change.

The development of smart cities and destinations heavily relies on geospatial technologies and intelligence. Geospatial aspects encompass location-based data and tools and are of significant importance in governing smart tourism destinations. This paper investigates the geospatial elements involved in the development of smart tourism destinations, by analyzing smart projects implemented in Novi Sad, Serbia. The theoretical framework draws upon the fields of geoinformatics, urban planning, and smart city development. Research conducted in Novi Sad reveals that the majority of smart initiatives, solutions, projects, and practices are geospatially oriented. To enhance the governing of smart cities, the paper introduces a comprehensive and adaptable catalogue of smart projects, which is easily navigable and comprehensible.

Serbian spas, with their abundant geothermal springs and air qualities, are a significant natural resource for the country. Nowadays, tourism industry has become a predominant beneficiary attracting both leisure- and health-related visits. Nonetheless, the literature on current consumer behavior is devoid of a model that incorporates both motivating and constraining factors in the spa and wellness industry’s decision-making process. Serbia’s spa industry is still adjusting to the needs of the modern wellness visitor as a result of the country’s unique transitional path. The purpose of this study is to ascertain the role of incentive and restrictions in the destination selection process of spa visitors in Serbia, to gain insight into the development of wellness tourism in a particular sociocultural environment. The analytical hierarchy process was used to determine the relative relevance of the consumer behavior elements evaluated. The findings indicate that non-medical motivations are becoming more important, implying that demand is finally shifting toward the wellness idea, which was initially disrupted by the country’s delayed transformation. The findings have administrative ramifications, the most significant of which were price strategies and product diversification.

Emerging city destinations frequently face numerous managerial challenges, resulting in common pitfalls and rookie mistakes. The evolution, new dynamics, and shift in tourism demand, together with many cities' efforts to diversify offerings and exploit their multi-attractiveness, necessitate a re-evaluation of present viewpoints on what motivates city break tourists. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to focus on scale development for emerging cities travel motivation; and to determine latent subpopulations (profiles) within a population of city break visitors based on their motivation to visit a city. The study used principal component analysis to test the dimensions of the emerging cities travel motivation factors scale. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to test the measurement model. Subtypes (profiles) of city break travel motivation factors were obtained using latent profile analysis (LPA). The following dimensions for the emerging cities travel motivation scale were identified: Image, Vibrance, and Novelty, Core Destination Values, Social Experience, Ego Boosting and Shopping, Psycho-physical Relaxation. Based on LPA analysis four profiles of emerging city visitors were defined: Indifferent, Conventional, Psycho-physical relaxing, ego-boosting, and Shopping city break tourists. From a theoretical standpoint, this study broadens the existing corpus of research on emerging cities travel motivation, allowing for the discovery of distinct latent groups of visitors as well as significant differences between them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper applies Importance-Performance Analysis (IPA) to investigate potential satisfaction or dissatisfaction with service quality at the internationally recognized Nisville Jazz Festival. The research was conducted using the Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software version 20, including the Kolmogorov–Smirnov test, factor analysis, one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA), and Principal Component Analysis (PCA) with Varimax rotation for data analysis. The study involved 250 festival attendees, focusing on their motivation and identification of both tangible and intangible attributes of the festival, with 227 providing valid responses to the survey questionnaire. The Service Quality Model (SERVQUAL) was used to identify quality factors. The results indicate that cultural content and hospitality are the most important factors significantly contributing to visitor satisfaction and positively influencing recommendations and repeat visits to the festival. Another important factor in the study is accessibility, while comfort, amenities, safety, and cleanliness require improvement to enhance the overall visitor experience. The findings provide concrete guidelines for the further development of the festival and the enhancement of the tourism offerings in Nis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigated the intersection of healthy and sustainable human settlement, and land use for spa tourism in rural areas. Recognizing the crucial role of youth in shaping the future of tourism, this research aimed to provide an insight into the young local rural community representatives' perception of sustainable spa tourism development and to identify whether these attitudes are shaped by their socio-demographic characteristics. The applied methodology was the Sustainable Tourism Attitude Scale (SUS-TAS). A total of 254 respondents took part in this research. Using SPSS 30.0.0, the gathered data were subjected to additional analyses based on factor analysis, descriptive statistics, and the general linear model. The results showed a general positive attitude of local community members towards the further development of spa tourism in their communities. The especially important factors were the following: long-term planning of development, environmental protection, negative attitudes towards spa tourism development, economic benefits, as well as community participation. By providing an empirical analysis based on the use of robust tools for measuring youth attitudes, this research offers valuable insights for policymakers, planners, and community leaders into how they can design and implement tourism strategies that align with sustainability principles while fostering local economic development and environmental stewardship. The ultimate goal is to contribute to the broader discussion on developing healthy, sustainable human settlements that balance economic benefits with ecological and social well-being. Synergy/harmony between communities and their natural surroundings is essential for the social, economic, and environmental sustainability of rural human settlements. Mineral springs and spas facilitate sensory experiences for individuals (both tourists and residents) through the utilization of natural resources and the environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to develop a new perspective on urban tourist motivations and demotivation's by applying the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) model in order to better understand how tourists make decisions about which destinations to visit. Authors discovered that most important factor within city break travel is internal force, followed by the external force and least important is demotivation. The paper argues that the results indicate the value of applying the AHP model to understand the role and importance both of push and pull factors and demotivators in urban tourism destination choice.

The practice of producing drone videos for hobby or commercial purposes has already created a vast amount of open and free video datasets. When these videos are properly authored, time-stamped and geo-referenced, they receive characteristics of volunteered geographic information (VGI). As alternative forms to user-generated content (UGC), these visually appealing footages attract significant attention, but their production faces different practical and motivational issues that could impose limitation on the value of this kind of VGI. In order to better understand volunteered geographic drone videos (VGDV) from the social media and VGI perspective we conceptualize and discuss prospects and problems that could be explored in further research. This paper contributes to the development of theory about aerial drone videos, exploration of aerial drone video UGC characteristics and to the applicability of drone videos in Digital Earth systems.

Recent natural hazards (floods and wildfires) which hit some of the most visited Greek tourist destinations during the summer season 2018 are threatening to decrease the number of tourist visits in the affected regions. As these regions, being namely Chalkidiki, Olympic Riviera and regions surrounding Athens and Thessaloniki, are the most popular summer destinations for Serbian tourists, it is interesting to examine how natural hazards that occurred there influence tourist behavior based on the perceived risk. The study aims to explore the role of psychological factors such as different personality traits and tourism worries on the tourist behavior based on the perceived risk of affected destinations. Moreover, the assumption was that tourism worrieswill mediate the relationship between analyzed personality traits and tourist behavior based on the perceived risk. Although previous studies investigated the effect of different psychological factors on tourist behavior based on the perceived risk, this is the first study to explore the interaction of different psychological factors including tourism worries, which previously were not analyzed in this context. Besides theoretical contribution, practical implications are also further discussed in the paper within the realm of their use for destination managers.

Geoarcheology is a term used to describe the work of experts who deal with the archeological record and combine the expertise of their different disciplines, mainly archeology and geology. Because such scientists have different educational backgrounds and use different research methods it was expected that they might value archeological sites (or geoarchaeological geosites) somewhat differently. The principal aim of this study is to show the results of the application of a GAM’s (Geosite Assessment Model) main values, rank indicators and sub-indicators according to the experts’ preferences and attitudes, as it was presumed that they are not of the same importance. For this purpose, the authors used a AHP (Analytical Hierarchy Process), widely used in decision-making analysis, to define the criteria weights and rank the indicators. Two main groups of expert respondents, geoscientists and archeologists, were surveyed and gave their criteria weights. The results obtained by application of the AHP showed that there is a difference in indicator weights. While both groups gave their highest value to the scientific/educational indictor, the geoscientists gave their higher rank to the scenic/aesthetic rather than to the protection indicator, the archeologists ranked them opposite, and gave their higher rank to the protection indicator and lowest rank to the scenic/aesthetic indicator. This paper further provides information on group decision or consensus on weights and shows the final rankings for both groups, which are further examined and discussed.

Geotourists, as visitors with a specific preference for geoheritage and attractive geodiversity, have been identified and typified by many authors worldwide. Considering that Serbia is recognized as an area of geotourism in its initiation phase, this type of research has not been conducted thus far. In spite of global trends, geotourism as a special interest form of travel does not exist in this region, and is principally related to speleotourism and pure admiration of aesthetic values of geodiversity. As one of the first studies of geotourism of such character in Serbia, the research presented within was conducted to reveal whether there is a certain level of interest for geoheritage amongst the general public. The questionnaire was conducted in 2015 on the territory of Vojvodina Province (North Serbia), counting a total of 198 respondents. Bearing in mind the lack of geotourism terminology within the study area, the general public is not familiar with the existence, attractiveness and even degradation of geodiversity. Hence, questions aimed to discover respondents’ habits and tendencies during travel, their attitude in everyday life, particularly towards nature (including the abiotic component). Last of all, the goal of the presented study is also to reveal whether there are certain types of potential geoheritage lovers - geotourists depending on their social-demographic characteristics. With specific profiles identified, results could be later used for geotourism planning, education, promotion and management in the Vojvodina region and wider.

Hydrological heritage is a relatively new concept in the field of geosite assessment. The principal aim of this study is to apply M-GAM (Modified geosite assessment model) for comparative analysis of the Krupaja spring and the Žagubica (Mlava) spring, located in Homolje area, in Eastern Serbia. According to the classification of geosites of Institute for Nature Conservation of Serbia, these sites are on the list of protected sites (“hydro(geo)logical” heritage sites) of extraordinary national importance; however, they still have not gained necessary recognition in Serbia. Thus, their assessment according to different target groups should provide a clearer picture of their current condition. As M-GAM considers that not all indicators for evaluation of geosites are of the same importance, this paper applies two methods for comparing and determining the importance of indicators and subindicators in the model (Analytical-hierarchy process (AHP) and descriptive statistics conducted by SPSS). Also, it is assumed that different target groups will give different importance to some indicators in the model, which would result in various evaluation scores for the same geosites. The paper also provides a comparative analysis of the assessment carried out by two different target groups – potential geotourists and geoexperts. The results obtained by AHP and descriptive statistics are quite similar, which confirms the reliability of respondents’ answers and the results gained. The analyzed sites are differently positioned in the evaluation matrix, and implications are further discussed in the paper.

In order to make recommendations for the diversification of tourism products on the Thai island of Phuket, this paper applies the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) method to rank the attractiveness of six cultural heritage sites in the island of Phuket to make recommendations for sites that could be incorporated in to cultural tourism development in the region. In addition, it applies a quantitative-qualitative evaluation structure with weighted criteria, based on local expert opinion. The research identified which of the many potential cultural tourism sites would be the most attractive to tourists and shows the utility of the AHP method, combined with quantitative-qualitative evaluation, for decision making in tourism destination development contexts.

Although cross-cultural interactions and cultural bubbles have been researched extensively in tourism, these issues have often been viewed one-sidedly. More precisely, in contemporary literature, cultural bubbles are mostly considered one-sided biases that prevent tourists from fully enjoying the culture of their hosts. Besides that, it is important to bear in mind that a tourist offer itself is also formed from the perspectives of tourism experience designers and tourism managers. Therefore, it is important to consider how the perception of a tourist offer is distorted by looking from inside the bubble of tourist culture. This paper highlights managers' cultural biases in designing tourist experiences, which have often been overlooked in cross-cultural tourism studies. It is crucial to have this discussion now so that the global tourist industry can continue to provide local experiences, as tourism managers and employees in the sector are increasingly interacting with people from diverse cultural contexts. This might be beneficial for the cultural expression of destinations, on the one hand, as well as for providing more valuable experiences for tourists, on the other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Tourism development can strongly affect purpose of land use at the destination and in surrounding areas. However, the effects of development in tourism destination cannot be easily visible and proven. Sometimes indicators of tourism development do not show its significant impact, but the structural changes are occurring and they affect land use. The aim of this paper is to employ methodology for assessing effects of development on land-use changes in tourism destination. Proposed methodology includes combination of the use of publically available geographical data, geographical information systems and landscape metrics. The applicability of this approach has been investigated in test region of Čajetina municipality (south-western part of the Republic of Serbia), where tourism industry has flourished in last decades. Time series of maps (2000 and 2006) have been obtained from CORINE land cover project. Landscape metrics for area, size and density have been calculated for the entire test region and for tourism destination at patch and class levels. The results showed significant effects of development on land use changes in investigated tourism area comparing to its surroundings.

Slow tourism is a type of alternative tourism that promotes the tourist experience by slowing down the pace, protecting the environment and improving of the tourist experience quality by engaging tourists with the place. It is a new idea that is gaining acceptance worldwide. This study is a reflection on how this type of tourism might grow in Vojvodina. The first goal of this study was to examine the characteristics of tourists who visited Vojvodina and to examine which destinations in Vojvodina are the most visited. Finally, the primary objective of the article was to investigate the motives travelers choose to travel to Vojvodina. Based on the research data of 243 participants who visited destinations in Vojvodina, two factors that motivate tourists (research and leisure) were identified, using the Exploratory Factor Analysis. Future studies on this subject in the surrounding countries can take advantage of the research methodology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]