The determination of behavioural patterns in tourism destinations through terrorism: lessons from Crete, Greece

Tourists regard terrorism as an influencing factor in selecting travel destinations, as well as transportation means. The Mediterranean is the most famous tourist destination globally, whilst Crete is one of the most famous Mediterranean island destinations. Since most visitors use airplanes to reach the island, the purpose of this study is to examine the perceptions of tourists travelling by air in accordance with the influence of terrorism, the process of destination selection, and their alternations in travelling behaviour. It also examines the perceptions of key informants which focus on risk and crisis management in aspects of terrorism and finally, compares tourists and key informants’ perspectives. In this study, the author began with a random starting method and then used structured interviewing in order to obtain objective, yet personal responses from the respondents (tourists). For key informants, the examination included the total population. For better comprehension of the perspectives’ formulation the author analysed four socio-demographic characteristics (gender, age, level of education, and marital status). The results provide interesting outcomes concerning the degree of the perceived risk factors that tourists and key informants consider when travelling, revealing that even if terrorism is promoted as an exceptionally significant factor, in reality its importance is not semantic. It also emphasises that terrorism is a mean for creating a psychological impact to visitors which influences both visitors’ and locals’ decisions and behavioural patterns, since through the process of confusion, government agencies manipulate the reactions and perspectives of locals and implement fear as a tool for societal control