Agent-Based Modelling of Tourism Development in Nova Scotia

The development of tourism has long been considered an effective strategy for economic revitalization. Research on the role of tourism within economic development has taken acompartmentalized view by defining and isolating individual tourist types. Agent-based modeling (ABM) techniques have proven useful for simulating non-linear, emergent behaviour within a target system. This type of dynamic, multi-actor interaction isprevalent in the field of tourism, and is an area well suited to study with ABMs. This presentation will outline one conceptual approach to studying tourist behaviour within a landscape of competitive destinations. The overarching research goal is to create a spatially explicit ABM to simulate the development of tourism in the province of NovaScotia, Canada. The model links agents to a GIS-based landscape and simulates anumber of heterogenous actors who are influenced by each other and the landscape in which they reside. The model agents are built around several tourist "archetypes", each one with a variable set of motivational and demographic characteristics. Tourist archetypes are identified conceptually from literature and empirically informed by Canadian Travel Survey (CTS) data, a continuously updated national database. As a component of model development, the ABM is placed within a regional tourism development framework. Scenario development using the ABM provides a novel method of analyzing tourism development and interactions.

Keywords: tourism development; agent-based modeling; social systems modeling