Examining the change in the rurality of rural tourism destinations: evidence from China

Rural tourism destinations that exhibit rurality can effectively enhance their core competitiveness. This study explores the evolving characteristics of rurality in typical rural tourism destinations near Nanjing City. Employing methodologies such as interviews, questionnaire surveys, exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, paired sample t-tests, potential conflict index, and cluster analysis, the study reveals that overall rurality perception has improved with tourism development. However, material and social aspects weakened, contrasting with a substantial improvement in the spiritual dimension. The potential conflict index analysis indicates conflicting post-development perceptions of rurality, with increased differences among individual items. Moreover, cluster analysis categorizes tourists into four groups: (1) rurality perception enhancers, (2) relatively neutral, (3) rational, and (4) rurality perception diminishers. These findings offer valuable insights for rural tourism management.