Answer To: Research Design Assignment 4 Notes and Instructions MNG10720 Associate Professor Martin Young Unit...
Soumi answered on May 21 2020
RESEARCH FOR BUSINESS AND TOURISM
(TOPIC: THE DARK SIDE OF ECOTOURISM: IMPACT OF RECREATIONAL ACTIVITIES ON AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL PARKS)
Table of Contents
1. Problem Statement and Research Objectives 3
2. Research Design 4
3. Data Collection Methods 4
4. Qualtrics Survey 5
5. Sample Selection 6
6. Data Analysis Techniques 7
7. Ethical Considerations 7
8. Reference List 9
Appendix 12
1. Problem Statement and Research Objectives
The increasing popularity of ecotourism as a sustainable tourism concept has begun depicting negative impacts on the national parks of Australia. Ecotourism is considered to be a beneficial form of tourism, where only the protected areas are visited, which are highly conserved, so that the tourism activities could bring about prosperity to the local people living in those areas (Sanzogni, Meekan & Meeuwig, 2015).
However, with the increase of the modernisation in the tourism activities as well as in those destinations, the impact of ecotourism is turning out to be highly negative for the national parks, such as Australian Alps, the environments of which have been most negatively affected due to the recreational activities during tourism. As mentioned by Newsome, Moore and Dowling (2013), when tourism activities involve recreational events, the natural flora and fauna of the place are most disrupted, whether intentionally or unintentionally.
As mentioned by Ban and Ramsaran (2017), the negative effects are induced to the environments of the parks due to the lack of flexibility of environment, duration of the recreational activities, type, intensity and frequency of the events. The problem statement of this research indicates the relation of these aspects to the damage caused to soil due to the activities.
Based on this research problem, the objectives will be:
· To assess the impact of tourism and their recreational activities on the vegetation of the place
· To analyse the effects of camping activities on tall alpine herb fields and entire subalpine grasslands
· To evaluate the influences of the mountain biking activities upon the soil, wildlife environment and vegetation of the place
2. Research Design
The methodological approach that could be suitable for this proposed research is a primary quantitative research that would involve the collection of data through quantitative methods of investigating the research issues. According to McCusker and Gunaydin (2015), in a primary research, first-hand, primary data is generated from the involvement of the human participants, who are directly associated with the research issues in any way. In the proposed research, since the activities of the tourists will be assessed for their impacts of the environments of the Australian national parks, therefore, it will be a pure research, following a primary methodology.
Background information will be generated by analysing the prevailing literature on the identified research issue, which will be done through descriptive research. As mentioned by Nery et al. (2018), a descriptive research is the one, in which the information are critically analysed in depth for a detailed perspective on the research issue.
On the other hand, exploratory research will not be chosen because it deals in exploring the research issues in cases when the actual issue is not identified (DeWitt, 2017). Similarly, explanatory research will not be chosen because as argued by Decoteau (2017), it only deals in explaining the prevailing concepts, rather than investigating anew. The methodology followed for this research, will be a quantitative one, as according to Larson‐Hall and Plonsky (2015), it is a time-saving, cost-effective, precise and accurate method of generating data.
3. Data Collection Methods
Data collection will be done by following a quantitative methodology, wherein only precise, numeric data will be collected. For that purpose, survey questionnaire method will be selected, which will be conducted online, with the help of a set of closed-ended, structured questions. These will be multiple-choice types with some options also in Likert scale format.
As suggested by Church and Waclawski (2017), surveys are selected for data collection, as these are very accurate method of collecting numeric data, in less time and at almost no expenses. The questionnaire forms will be distributed online through Qualtrics software and the participants, who answer all the questions, unbiasedly, as well as completely, will be selected for analysis, as it would generate accurate responses (Panero et al., 2016).
On the other hand, as argued by Brinkmann (2014), interviews cannot be conducted, as it is a qualitative method of data collection, where elaborately, data is collected in this method. Hence, it is a time-intensive method with complex set-up, which is why it would not be selected for the proposed research. Besides, the quantitative methods also eliminate chances of biases, which are prevalent in qualitative methods (Hussein, 2015).
On the contrary, the other methods for conducting a quantitative research are longitudinal studies, case studies, observations and structured interview. Structured interviews would not be conducted, as its setting is also elaborative, similar to that of a...