With the increasing rate growth of tourism and the increased intensity of tourism activities, many local communities are experiencing the impacts from such situation. While many of these impacts have a positive effect for the host community, negative impacts can also occur if those in a position to influence the direction of development become insensitive to the potential of the impacts.
From tourism development perspective, perceived positive or negative impacts by local residents is an important factor to determine whether any tourism development projects will gain the support from local residents. Many tourism researches explain this phenomenon based on Social Exchange Theory (SET). The tourism industry in any form consists of exchanges between and among individuals, various stakeholder groups and organizations. Some community residents gain the benefits of tourism, while others may be negatively impacted. SET suggests people evaluate an exchange based on the costs and benefits incurred as a result of that exchange. Residents who perceive themselves as benefiting from tourism are likely to view it positively, while resident who perceive themselves as incurring costs are likely to view tourism negatively (McCool and Moisey, 2008). These perceived impacts are related with the degree to which residents will support the tourism development as Nunkoo and Ramkissoon (2011) conducted a resident survey in a resort community in Mauritius and found that the more residents perceived tourism as having positive impacts, the more they were likely to support tourism. If residents had negative perceptions, they were less likely to support tourism sector.
The impacts from tourism development can cover many aspects. Yoon et al. (2001) examine the structural effects of four tourism-impact factors on total impact and on local residents’ support for tourism development. The findings of the study confirm the existence of four tourism-impacts constructs pertaining to economic, social, cultural, and the environment impacts. The economic and cultural impacts are positively associated with the total tourism impacts, while the social and environmental impacts negatively affected the total tourism impact. In addition the direct negative effect of environmental impact on tourism support indicates that local residents are highly concerned with the negative effect of tourism development on the environment.
There are many research projects try to investigate factors influencing local residents support for tourism development. Untong et al. (2010) examine this issue in four Thailand’s famous destinations including Chiang Mai, Phuket, Pattaya, and Pai. They found that local residents see private cooperation as an important factor in their support for local tourism development. Economic impact is the main factor influencing local resident support for tourism development especially in traditional tourist destinations such as Phuket and Pattaya. In more new tourist destination like Chiang Mai and Pai, local residents pay attention more on local employment opportunities.
Schofield (2011) investigates city resident attitudes to proposed tourism development and its impacts on the community in the Worsley area of the city of Salford, England. The results reveal that the community is divided on the issue of support for tourism development based on the perceived benefits and costs of tourism and that the anticipated negative environment consequences are significantly more influential than positive economic or social impacts. Besculides et al. (2002) examined resident perceptions of the cultural benefits of tourism in an area of southwestern Colorado. The researchers concluded that residents regarded tourism as a means of helping them learn about, share and preserve their culture.