Active Sport Tourism in Europe: Applying Market Segmentation Model Based on Human Values

The purpose of this study was to examine if human values sets indicating basic motivational aspects, shared by active sport participants, could be used for the creation of a specific market segmentation model. While the exploration of motivation scales and sport tourist typologies was vast, although limited to small samples, this research constructed a model that tested its applicability and validity on the large general samples. By using data collections from the European Social Survey, the model allowed comparability between surveyed countries by cross-checking multiple psycho-social and demographic factors. The findings identified four main factors that determine active sport tourist values, while at the same time, multiple-discriminant analysis indicated the existence of three active sport clusters, indicating preferences of different sport tourist segments. Furthermore, the study analyzed potential demand markets according to the geographical distribution of active sport segments. The study confirmed that basic human values play an important role in explaining motivation aspects in sport- and tourism-related choices. Overall, the findings may assist marketers in monitoring changes in preferences of sport participants and focus on specific marketing strategies for different segments