Predicting international visitors’ interest in Hong Kong arts festival

Abstract

Major international arts festivals are responsible for attracting many international visitors to a location. This study proposes that the high profile major international acts that are programmed within a particular festival play an important role in attracting international visitors to the event. This empirical study was conducted to predict the demographic, attitudinal, and behavioral factors of international visitors that could influence their interest in attending performances of international artists (i.e., those imported for the event) that had taken place at the Hong Kong Arts Festival. It employs descriptive statistics, paired samples t test, and logistic regression as analytical techniques in order to achieve the above objective. A total of 129 samples were drawn randomly from both male and female international visitors. The results from t tests, which generated two-variable correlation coefficient values with corresponding levels of statistical significance, suggest that the show event that most significantly (p≤0.05) influenced international visitors' attendance was the Northern Sinfonia and Chorus, and the Latvian National Opera: Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk was the second most important show event. The results from the logistic regression model suggest that international visitors' interest, in particular international performances, was mostly influenced by their demographic and behavioral factors, but not by their attitudinal factors. This study suggests that relevant programming strategies should consider why, at which degree, and how the demographic, attitudinal, and behavioral factors of international visitors are important to attracting them to and to increasing their interest in the arts festivals of this kind. Although the main limitation of this study is the use of a small subset of samples, further research could overcome this by considering a larger sample size and looking into the demographic, attitudinal, and behavioral factors of international or local visitors that could influence their interest in some other arts festival events/shows showcasing local artists and productions.