DOES SOCIAL CAPITAL INFLUENCE RESIDENT’S ATTITUDES TOWARDS TOURISM DEVELOPMENT IN SRI LANKA?

This study examines the resident’s attitudes towards tourism development and adds the perceived social capital as a factor of attitudes which makes this study distinct from existing literature. We apply logistic regression models with descriptive statistical methods to achieve the research objectives. For rural community, occupation status, contacts with tourism industry, trust, degree of participation, and membership of business association are significant determinants of resident’s positive attitudes towards tourism development. The length of residency and membership of community association determines resident’s negative attitude towards tourism. For the urban community, this study finds age group, the degree of participation of community association, contacts with tourism industry and membership of community business association significant factors of resident’s positive attitudes towards tourism. The education, length of residency in the community and contacts with tourism industry explains resident’s negative attitudes towards tourism. Conversely, both rural and urban residents believe in future tourism development, whereas, social capital is insignificant about future tourism development in urban community. This study suggests policy decisions related to tourism development in a community have to consider residents as stakeholders and also, should consider the resident’s attitudes towards sustainable tourism development.