The formation mechanism of tourist loyalty in ecotourism scenic spots from the perspective of tourist perceived value: Evidence from Xixi National Wetland Park

Tourist perceived value indicates the perceived evaluation of the overall value of tourist attractions, and is considered as a new source of competitive advantage for tourist attractions. At the same time, ecotourism scenic spots should win the long-term tourist value in order to maintain a sustained competitive advantage, so exploring the formation of tourist loyalty mechanisms becomes the focus of attention. Taking Xixi National Wetland Park as an example, this paper carries out a second-order confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) on tourist perceived value in the wetland park. Moreover, using maximum likelihood estimation method, this paper employs the structural equation model (SEM) to conduct an empirical test to identify the relationship among tourist perceived value, tourist satisfaction, and tourist loyalty. The results show that tourist perceived value in the wetland park contains eight-factor structures. Tourist perceived value in the wetland park not only has a direct positive impact on tourist loyalty, but also has an indirect influence. This shows that tourist satisfaction plays a part-mediated role between tourist perceived value and tourist loyalty, and the indirect effect is greater than the direct effect. It shows that tourist satisfaction mediates the relationship between tourist perceived value and tourist loyalty, demonstrating that tourist satisfaction is an important mediator for explaining how tourist perceived value leads to positive tourist loyalty. In addition, the indirect effect is also greater than the direct effect.