Tackling the Seasonality Problem in the North: The Destination Seasonal Image of Lapland from the Viewpoint of Japanese People

Abstract

The empirical phenomenon investigated in this thesis was the destination seasonal image of Lapland from the viewpoint of Japanese people. Finnish Lapland faces extensively the problem of tourism seasonality. For example, the physical and social structures designed for the winter peak season are underutilised during the rest of the year (Rantala et al., 2019). There were no previous literatures specifically focusing on Lapland as a whole region and the seasonal difference of the destination image from the viewpoint of Japanese people. The theoretical framework utilised in this study was the destination image theory introduced by Gartner (1994). The thesis investigated how Japanese people recognised Lapland as a travel destination from the viewpoint of cognitive, affective, and conative destination image. The aim of this research was to explore the seasonal destination image of Lapland from the viewpoint of Japanese people. To gain an understanding of this phenomenon, three research questions were investigated in this research. ● RQ1: What kind of cognitive, affective and conative destination image do Japanese people have towards Lapland depending on the seasons? ● RQ2: What kind of perceptions do they have towards activities in Lapland depending on the seasons? ● RQ3: What factors might discourage Japanese people from visiting Lapland? The questionnaire was distributed to Japanese people and 155 responses were collected. The results were categorised into three destination images. The results showed that the Japanese people had the positive affective and conative destination image both for the summer and winter. Especially the people who had known Lapland before the questionnaire distribution and the people who had been to or had lived in Lapland had more positive affective and conative destination image towards summer Lapland, so they would be one of the appropriate targets for the summer tourism development to achieve year-around tourism in Lapland without seasonality.