CASINO TOURISM IN THE TOURIST DESTINATION IGUAÇU: THE MOTIVATIONS OF BRAZILIAN TOURISTS

Abstract:

Casino tourism is the subject of this research, whose spatial focus is the Tourist Destination Iguaçu, on the triple border between Brazil, Paraguay, and Argentina, and which offers gambling as one of its products. The research contributes to filling a gap in the literature on casino tourism in Brazil, seeking to understand the factors that prompt visitors to these attractions, from the tourist's perspective. The general objective is to identify the motivational factors that lead Brazilian tourists to visit the casinos of the Tourist Destination Iguaçu. The methodology used was of qualitative and documentary, and the source of data was comments from tourists on the TripAdvisor platform. The comments were captured using Python software, obtaining a sample of 2,197 comments written in Portuguese, between August 2012 and March 2020. The data were tabulated and processed, using the R software to analyze the text contained in the comments. This analysis generated a set of quadrigrams (four-word sequences) to catalog the motivational factors that emerged from the analyzed corpus. Applying content analysis, the quadrigrams were classified into the motivational categories of the two-dimensional push and pull model proposed by Dann (1977) and Crompton (1979). It was observed that the motivations that most encourage tourists to visit casinos (push) are centered around the factors “novelty”, followed by “socialization” and “rest and relaxation”. Regarding the characteristics that attract tourists to the casinos (pull), the factor “infrastructure” appears first, followed by “bars and entertainment” and “accommodation and transport”.

Keywords:
Tourism; Casinos; Motivation; Push and Pull; TripAdvisor