International tourists’ destination choice differences according to Plog’s personality types: analyzing the case of Mongolia based on the recreation opportunity spectrum

In the international tourism market, the number of arrivals in Asian regions is increasing every year, and that of foreign tourists in Mongolia, a new tourism market, is also rapidly rising. This study tests differences in the destination choice among international tourists visiting Mongolia using the Plog’s personality model. It classifies Mongolia into several regions using the recreation opportunity spectrum and then tests whether Plog’s personality types significantly affect the destination choice. Analytical results based on the data of an on-site survey of 406 U.S., South Korean, and Russian tourists recruited at eleven representative destinations present that while the tourists are categorized into psychocentric, midcentric, and allocentric types, allocentric tourists are the largest in number. Also, Plog’s personality types are found to differentiate tourist destination choices when socio-demographic and travel-related confounding variables are controlled for. Allocentric tourists are likely to visit primitive areas, whereas psychocentrics tend to visit urban tourist attractions. Accordingly, this study confirms the validity of the recreation opportunity spectrum and Plog’s personality types, using the case of Mongolia with unique natural, urban, and tourism settings. Also, tourism service providers and marketers may benefit from the segmentation technique and analytical results suggested in this study in order to assess the needs of their visitors.Highlights This study uses the recreation opportunity spectrum and Plog’s model together.The study conducts a survey of inbound tourists in Mongolia.Tourists’ destination choice can be varied by personality characteristics.