Academic Year 2019/2020

  • Teaching Mode: Traditional lectures
  • Campus: Rimini
  • Corso: First cycle degree programme (L) in Economics of Tourism (cod. 8847)

Learning outcomes

This course aims to provide statistical techniques for investigating tourism phenomena. In this context, particular emphasis is addressed to the descriptive and inferential techniques for data analysis. Methods are oriented to the quantitative analysis of the main characteristics of tourism supply and demand.

Course contents

DATA, MEASUREMENT AND ERROR

  • Data sources and their classification
  • Qualitative and quantitative research
  • Measurement and the theory of errors
  • Measurement scales and their properties

THE RESEARCH PROCESS AND SURVEY DESIGN

  • Sources of error in primary surveys, sampling and non-sampling errors
  • The primary research process
  • Steps in a survey research design
  • Reference population and sampling

DATA COLLECTION: TRIALS, QUESTIONNAIRES AND FIELD WORK

  • Issues in designing questionnaires for primary research
  • Administration methods
  • Tourism surveys & data
  • Scaling techniques

FUNDAMENTALS OF STATISTICS

  • Variables and observations
  • Random variables
  • Functions: deterministic functions, stochastic functions
  • Frequency, probability, and distributions
  • Descriptive statistics
  • Means, expected values, variability measures
  • Joint marginal and conditional distributions

SAMPLING

  • Probability and non-probability sampling
  • Accuracy and precision
  • The indirect problem and inference
  • Simple random sampling
  • Confidence levels and accuracy
  • Selection bias
  • Types of sampling

HYPOTHESIS TESTING

  • Hypothesis testing
  • Significance, confidence and power
  • One mean test
  • One and two tailed tests
  • Two means test
  • Tests on proportion, variances, correlation coefficients, regression coefficients

CORRELATION AND REGRESSION

  • Covariance, correlation and partial correlation
  • Bivariate regression
  • Multiple regression and variable selection

MODELLING TOURISM SUPPLY AND DEMAND

  • Theory and empirical models
  • Data requirements
  • Interpretation of estimation outputs
  • Examples

Readings/Bibliography

Lecture notes, selected articles and book chapters will be provided through the on-line e-learning platform and will be sufficient for preparing the exam.

For those students seeking additional or more structured materials, the course is based on the following textbook:

Mazzocchi, M, 2008, Statistics for Marketing and Consumer Research, Sage, Los Angeles. Selected chapters will be provided through the e-learning platform

Other useful readings:

Baggio, R., and Klibas, J. (2017), Quantitative Methods in Tourism: A Handbook, 2nd Edition. Channel View Publications

Dwyer, L., Gill, A., Seetaram, N. (2012, Eds.) Handbook of Research Methods in Tourism: Quantitative and Qualitative Approaches. Edward Elgar

Teaching methods

Lectures, class exercises, take-home exercises through the e-learning platforms

Assessment methods

Written exam, consisting of three sections:

1) A multiple choice section on the theoretical contents of the course

2) Interpretation of statistical output (as generated in class tutorial during the course)

3) Interpretation of published output (from Tourism Economics journals)

Teaching tools

The e-learning platform will provide students with:

- Lecture slides and notes

- Useful readings (articles, book chapters, etc.)

- Data, outputs and codes for practical applications

- Exam-type questions

These materials will be provided and integrated throughout the course.

Office hours

See the website of Mario Mazzocchi

SDGs

Responsible consumption and production

This teaching activity contributes to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals of the UN 2030 Agenda.