ORIGINAL RESEARCH
The Effect of Psychological Factors
and Ecotourism on Residents’ Ecological
Behavior in National Park in China
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School of Public Administration, China University of Geosciences (Wuhan), Wuhan, China
Submission date: 2020-06-23
Final revision date: 2020-09-16
Acceptance date: 2020-09-27
Online publication date: 2021-01-21
Publication date: 2021-03-08
Corresponding author
Delin Huang
School of Public Administration, China University of Geosciences (Wuhan), China
Pol. J. Environ. Stud. 2021;30(3):2191-2201
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ABSTRACT
For ecological security, China is actively promoting the national park system pilot. The residents
are important stakeholders in the ecological protection of national parks, and their ecological behavior
is affected by the internal psychological factors as well as the external way of livelihood. At present,
there are few studies on the ecological behavior of Chinese national park residents. The study attempted
to expand the socio-psychological behavior model i.e. Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB), including
new structure ecotourism which combining ecological protection and personal well-being. Taking
Shennongjia National Park as an example, 253 questionnaires gathered from the residents were
analyzed by structural equation modeling. Results showed that the residents’ three psychological factors
(attitude towards behavior (β = 0.283, p<0.001), subjective norm (β = 0.177, p<0.01), and perceived
behavioral control (β = 0.195, p<0.01)) positively and significantly influenced their ecological intention;
their ecological intention (β = 0.322, p<0.001) further impacted their behavior, and attitude towards
behavior was proved to be the main key factor influencing the residents’ ecological intention. Moreover,
ecotourism had the greatest positively and significantly influence on the residents’ ecological intention
(β = 0.383, p<0.001) and behavior (β = 0.250, p<0.001). So the local government and the national
park management department should take various measures to deepen the residents’ sense of identity
and responsibility for the ecological protection in national parks, and also encourage the residents to
participate in ecotourism.