An Empirical Study of Tourist Satisfaction in Malaysia

Abstract

Tourism is a fast-growing business that receives global attentions. A successful tourism business brings huge benefits to host countries. In Malaysia, the study on tourism satisfaction context is still limited although Malaysian tourism industry grows rapidly. Hence, conducting more research focusing on tourist satisfaction in the Malaysian context is essential. In order to understand tourist satisfaction better, three factors, that is, experience, service quality and value that are related to satisfaction were examined in this paper. The population of the study was all tourists travelling to Malaysia. A sample was drawn using a multi-stage sampling method. A total of 301 completed and useful questionnaires were used for data analysis. The statistical analyses carried out include Pearson Correlation test and Multiple Regression analysis. The findings showed that value, experience and service quality were the three important variables that collectively contributed to tourist satisfaction level in the Malaysian context. In addition, the contribution of each individual factor on satisfaction revealed that the most influential factor is value, followed by experience. However, the service quality as an individual factor was not considered significant unless it was packed together with value and experience. Therefore, this study suggests that these three factors must be considered and the combination of all three factors must be offered as a complete package to attract many more tourists to visit Malaysia.

DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n6s4p359