Critical Analysis of Mountain Riders’ Attributes, Motivation, and Travel Patterns in Adventure Tourism Inside England

Present research investigation mainly focuses on investigating the travel patterns, attributes, and motivation of Mountain riders in adventure tourism in England. In present study, researcher investigated the research problem relating to inconsistent responses in previous studies to the adventure tourism and mountain biking in UK. Moreover, no previous study mainly focused on “England” as a specific region to explore research variables. Therefore, this study is significant to explore trends, determinants, and motivation in England’s Mountain riders. The literature review contains updated models and theories related to research problem. This study critically investigates the variables identified in the studies of Phan (2010); Gajda (2010); Beckley (2013); Beckman (2013), and Leung et al., (2014). The literature has explored the dimensions suggested by Keopke (2005) and Sung (1997) to measure its role in newly developed tourism market. The positivism philosophy enabled researcher to design a cross-sectional study commenced in 4 months by following mixed method (qualitative + quantitative) approach. England is case study therefore 7 out 12 adventure tourism destinations were selected through convenience sampling technique. Survey and interviews were primary research tools to explore research variables. Sample size for survey was 89 and interviews with IMBA officials via email were conducted from 6 employees. These were commenced through convenient sampling technique. Close-ended questions were used to ensure frequency on ordinal scale is maintained accurately. The findings of present study revealed that experience has no correlation with type of mountain biking and selection of adventure tourism destination. The study differs with the work of Lou et al., (2014). Moreover, the attributes like risk (Beckley, 2013), self-actualization, self-awareness, self-recognition, self-esteem (Gajda, 2010; Phan, 2010, Beckman, 2013; and Lou, 2014) are confirmed through this study. Findings also revealed that trend in England for adventure tourism has increased and well-educated, matured with good income are mostly involved in mountain biking and adventure tourism, supporting work of Gajda (2010). The recommendations and suggestions to improve adventure tourism activities are given at the last chapter along with implications for future researchers.