A scale development to measure the motivatons of culture tourists travelling with their historical links: Example of Balkans

The contents of the current motivation scales are thought to be insufficient in measuring the motivations of Turkish tourists visiting the Balkans when the political, social, and cultural associations of Turkey and the Balkan States; and the Balkan-origin people living in Turkey are taken into consideration. In this study, aiming to develop an authentic scale to measure the travel motivations of culture tourists travelling with their historical links, exploratory sequential design (a scale development design) was used. Exploratory sequential design is among the mixed methods in which qualitative and quantitative research designs are used together. In the qualitative phase of the study, in depth semi-structured interviews were done with 12 participants and the data were subjected to content analysis. A question form was prepared by using the codes obtained from the qualitative analysis. The data for the study were collected in Skopje, Macedonia in May and June 2018. An exploratory factor analysis was applied for the first 392 questionnaires. The confirmatory factor analysis was applied to 395 questionnaires thereafter and the validity of the scale, consisting 26 items except for the demographic questions, was ensured.