Plog’s Model of Typologies of Tourists

One of the best-known models in the travel and tourism field is one proposed by Stanley Plog. According to Plog, destinations rise and fall in popularity because they appeal to specific types of tourists over time, and follow a relatively predictable pattern of growth and decline in popularity. Plog delineated these types of tourists according to personality-based, psychographic traits along a continuum in a bell-shaped, normally distributed curve. The tourist typology proposed in the model describes the destination characteristics and activities that are preferred by tourists while on vacation. Thus, Plog’s model has been used as a reference for planning and designing tourism infrastructure and marketing projects. In addition, [Page 954]researchers have examined the model’s ability to predict what kinds of destinations people choose. This ...