Holidays at home: Analysis of the activities of non-travellers during their holidays and the resulting economic effects for their region of residence

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Jürgen Schmude
• Subject Area: Human Geography
• Term: since 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 509466359

Research in tourism studies understandably focuses primarily on travellers when analysing the demand side. Accordingly, the characteristics of tourists, their motivation and the effects they have on the destinations have been studied many times. However, although travelling has developed into a mass phenomenon and basic need in Germany in the course of the 20th century, a part of the population does not undertake (or only sporadically undertakes) holiday trips. Even before the COVID 19 pandemic, this was true for about a quarter of the population in Germany; due to the pandemic, this proportion has increased significantly in 2020 and 2021. Nevertheless, the socio-economic characteristics of these non-travellers, their spatial distribution, their "alternative" activities during their holidays and the economic effects they have on their region of residence are still hardly known. Yet knowledge about these non-travellers is becoming more and more important, as the costs of travelling will change due to changing framework conditions (e.g. due to rising costs for mobility). On the other hand, environmentally friendly lifestyles are gaining in importance, which, among other things, are increasingly critically questioning the ecological consequences of travel (e.g. emissions from air travel). As a result, the proportion of non-travellers could increase in the future. Therefore, the project proposed here aims to determine the activities of non-travellers during their holidays (e.g. what do they do as an alternative to travelling and where do they carry out these activities). It also aims to analyse the economic impact of non-travellers' activities on their area of action (e.g. what they spend their money on, how much and how often).

• DFG Programme: Research Grants