cultural tourists

Human beings take a step in the path of discovery and searching the universe. Meanwhile, travel is one of the means of searching wisdom and experience for communicating with the land, nature and the world’s creator, as well as finding meaning and concept of life. Therefore, humans understand travel as a source of perception and take benefits from it for recognizing themselves and the universe. The term "spiritual perception" is defined as a way for understanding and interpreting all non-material affairs related to the origin of human soul which has been investigated in this research. In this regarda qualitative-quantitative method has been applied in which the spiritual perception factors were obtained by using concept analysis method after conducting deep interviews with experts. Four factors of human hypothesis, spiritual truth, outward truth and human interaction were considered. Study population consisted of foreign cultural tourists travelling to the City of Isfahan from March to June 2018.  Gathered data was analyzed by using structural equation and Smart PLS. The results showed that all the hypotheses of research were confirmed and there were meaningful relationships among tourists' spiritual perception and mentioned factors.    

Cultural tourism is the cornerstone of understanding the cultures of nations. This form of tourism facilitates cultural exchange and plays an undeniable role in the development of international relations. This research, which is applied in purpose and descriptive-analytical in method, based on both documentary and field studies, aims to explore the effects of cultural heritage tourism on strengthening friendly relations between nations and promoting global peace. The Golestan and Saadabad Palaces in Tehran were selected as the case study, and the tourists visiting these two palaces were chosen as the research sample. The field data for the study were collected through a researcher-designed questionnaire, based on variables related to cultural heritage tourism, tangible and intangible heritage, and global peace. Due to the unclear definition of the statistical population, the sample size was determined using Cochran's formula, resulting in a sample of 321. However, 273 complete and valid questionnaires were collected. SPSS software was used for data processing, and Pearson correlation tests were employed for data analysis. The results indicate that cultural heritage tourists play a significant role in enhancing friendly relations and contributing to a peaceful global environment. This role is attributed to the tourists' familiarity with cultural heritage and the modification of pre-existing attitudes. Most tourists acknowledged the transformation of their previously ambiguous and sometimes hostile attitudes into a friendly and amicable atmosphere.