| The independent travel is the first choice for the foreign tourists who have been to China, but the group package travel is the first choice for the foreign tourists first time to China. By using the social network analysis and method of cartographic representation, the purpose of this study is to compare the geographical distribution and network structure characteristics of inbound foreigner independent tourist flows with that of the foreigner group package tourist flows in China. Sample was collected in9popular tourism destinations in China, including Beijing, Shanghai, Xi’an and so on, by survey and interview method.The results show that:(1) There are both commonness and differences between the distribution of the inbound foreigner independent tourist flows and the foreigner group package tourist flows. The commonness are:Firstly, Beijing and Shanghai are core ports, Hong Kong is the assistant port for both the networks. Secondly, both the foreigner independent tourist flows and the foreigner group package tourist flows distribute in the southeast of Hu Line, and on the national scale, the majority of tourist flows are both transferred between Beijing and Xi’an, two regional concentrated distribution areas of tourist flows are both formed:Yangtze River delta, Pearl River delta. Thirdly, Beijing is extremely popular to both the foreigner independent tourists and the foreigner group package tourists who visited only one destination. The differences are:Firstly, Guangzhou is another core port for the foreigner independent tourist flows except Beijing and Shanghai. Secondly, much more destinations are visited by the foreigner independent tourist flows than that of the foreigner group package tourist flows, and Sichuan-Yunnan region is another regional concentrated distribution for the foreigner independent tourist flows area, meanwhile, Taipei appears in the destinations of independent tourists’ China Tour. Thirdly, Guangzhou is also extremely popular to the foreigner independent tourists who visited only one destination except Beijing.(2) There are both commonness and differences between the moving regulations of the inbound foreigner independent tourist flows and the foreigner group package tourist flows. The commonness are:Firstly, the relation between numbers of the city pairs and the volume of the two kinds of tourist flows both accord with the Pareto law-principle or80/20, which states that the first20percent of the city pairs produced80percent of the flows. Secondly, the most representative city pair of the two kinds of tourist flows are both Beijingâ†'Xi’an. The differences are:Firstly, there are seldom city pairs of the foreigner independent tourist flows that get high frequency except Beijingâ†'Xi’an, only the flow produced between Beijing and Shanghai is much, and the flows of the two directions is balanced, but there are more city pairs of the group package tourist flows that get high frequency except Beijingâ†'Xi’an, which are produced in the Yangtze River delta. The group package tourist flows is less, and the main flow is Beijingâ†'Shanghai. Secondly, the foreigner flows that concentrated by the independent tourists who visited3or more destinations tend to spread on the national scale, such as the Beijingâ†'Xi’anâ†'Guilin/Chengdu, Beijingâ†'Shanghaiâ†'>Hangzhou/Guilin, but the the foreigner flows that concentrated by the group package tourists who visited3or more destinations tend to spread in the Yangtze River delta, such as the Shanghaiâ†'Suzhouâ†'Hangzhou and Hangzhouâ†'Suzhouâ†'Shanghai.(3) The nodes in the foreigner independent tourist flows network and the foreigner group package tourist flows network both can be divided into5types:comprehensive nodes, hub nodes, transfer nodes, important nodes, and common nodes. In the foreigner group package tourist flows network, Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Hong Kong are comprehensive nodes, Xi’an, Guilin, Chengdu, Hangzhou, Suzhou, Wuhan, Chongqing are hub nodes, Najing is an important node, Kunming is an transfer node, Pingyao, Shenzhen, Yangshuo, Wuxi and Wuzhen and other46nodes are fringe nodes. In the foreigner independent tourist flows, Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Hong Kong are comprehensive nodes, Guilin, Chengdu, Hangzhou, Kunming, Shenzhen, Yangshuo, Nanjing, Dalian, Xiamen, Suzhou, Chongqing, Lijiang, Wuhan, Macao and Dali are hub nodes, Xining and Yiwu are important nodes, Qingdao and Ningbo are transfer nodes, Datong, Pingyao, Huangshan and other83nodes are fringe nodes.(4) There are both commonness and differences between the moving regulations of the inbound foreigner independent tourist flows and the foreigner group package tourist flows. The commonness are:Firstly, both the foreigner group package tourist flows network and the foreigner independent tourist flows network are Core-Periphery networks, associated networks and small-world networks. Secondly, Beijing, Shanghai, Xian, Chengdu, Guilin, Guangzhou, Hangzhou, Kunming, Nanjing, Wuhan, Suzhou and Hong Kong are core nodes not only in the foreigner independent tourist flows network.but also in the foreigner group package tourist flows network. Thirdly, the density of the two network are both very low, and the centralized trend are both obviously. Fourthly, the city pairs formed by any two nodes of Beijing, Xi’an, Guilin, Shanghai, Chengdu have high point connectivity. Beijing-Shanghai, Beijing-Xi’an and Beijing-Guilin are the city pairs that have high point connectivity both in the foreigner group package tourist flows network and the foreigner independent tourist flows network. The differences are:Firstly, there are more nodes in the independent tourist flows network, and density of it is even lower. Secondly, the compliance of the group package tourist flows network for Core-Periphery network is higher. Thirdly, except the12common core nodes, Chongqing is a core node in the foreigner group package tourist flows network, Yangshuo, Shenzhen, Dalian, Xiamen, Lijiang, Macao, Qingdao, Ningbo, Changchun, Fuzhou, Haikou, Baotou are other12core nodes in the foreigner independent tourist flows network. Fourthly, the city pairs formed by any two nodes of Beijing, Xi’an, Guilin, Shanghai, Chengdu, Guangzhou and Hong Kong have high point connectivity in the foreigner independent tourist flows network, Guangzhou and Hong Kong are added than the group package tourist flows network.(5) The China National Tourism Administration should lead the optimization of the foreigner independent tourist flows network and the foreigner group package tourist flows network, and the government agencies of the destinations should take measures in order to expand inbound tourism market of China.The innovations of this study are:The contrast of the geographical distribution and the topological structure between the foreigner independent tourist flows network and the foreigner group package tourist flows network is analyzed firstly, and the dynamics in foreigner independent tourist flows network is simulated firstly. |
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