The study of the tourists travel behavior in the traveling to Hokkaido on the people of Taiwan

[[abstract]]Japan has always been a favorite tourist destination for most Taiwanese. Hokkaido has been one of the most popular places in recent years. The characteristics of the abundant “aesthetics of natural scenery” and “diversity of delicious food” had made hallmarks for Hokkaido tourist business in the past 10 years. The present study is based on the theory of planned behavior to explore the potential factors of attracting Taiwanese tourists to Hokkaido. The sample subjects are Taiwanese who are both citizens and residents above 18 years old. There were 540 questionnaires distributed. The valid returns were 502 (total returns were 510, however 8 of them were not completed. Effective returned rate 94.4%). The results are as followings: (1) more females than males participated in this survey; (2) the majority of the respondents are of age 30-39 and reside in the northern region of Taiwan and are white-color workers; (3) the education level are predominant at university/college and most of them are married; (4) the average monthly income is about NT30001-40000; (5) most of the respondents who have ever visited Japan is about once or twice; (6) the majority of them spent approximately NT30001-40000 in Japan traveling; (7) travel magazine, book and news papers are the primary information sources for Hokkaido travel. In addition, the data from this study also show that about 47% of the respondents would like to visit Hokkaido within a year in the future, whereas about 59.3% of those who have been in Hokkaido would like to revisit Hokkaido again. This shows a positive recognition is geared towards attitude, subjective norm, perceived behavior control to the intentions of the respondents regardless whether they have visited Hokkaido or not. Based on the regression analysis on the effects of behavior intention regarding Hokkaido travel, three factors, i.e. attitude, subjective norm and perceived behavior control, have been identified and reached significant differences. It is noted that “perceived behavior control” has most influential effect, and the next is the “subjective norm”. Moreover, it has been shown that the “convenience” in “perceived behavior control”, “subjective norm” and the “affective” in attitudes constitutes the main influential factors. It is concluded that the “attitudes”, “subjective norm” and “perceived behavior control” affect the behavior intentions of respondents on Hokkaido travel. Therefore, it is suggested that should aggressively use multiple channels to advertise the scenery of Hokkaido and provide multi-facets on Hokkaido traveling journey as well as on Hokkaido travel information to attract more Taiwanese people in the near future.