| As the aging problems become more and more severe, how to improve the elderly’s life quality turns into an issue of common interest. This problem not only relates to the social stability and development, but also must be solved in the process of constructing a harmonious society. An aging population bring serious test to all the departments of the society. The travel problem of the elderly affects their living standards and arouses the concern of the whole society. Daily travel is a fundamental part of daily activities of the elderly and the necessary condition for them to enjoy a better life. With the continuous development of social economy in our country, the social security system has been improved gradually, and the living standard of the elderly is improved constantly. The elderly consumers’ attitudes are also changing. Travel demands of elderly people are increasing, and travelers become an important part to improve the quality of life of the elderly. Therefore with the understanding the daily travel characteristics of older people, we can really meet the growing travel demands maximally and guide the elderly people to sustainable travel. With this goal, this study did a research project in the following ways:I) The paper summarizes the literatures about the activity space, the elderly travel behavior, travel and the subjective sense of happiness., this paper also points out the advantages and disadvantages existing in the previous research, and points out the shortcomings of existing research.II) In order to fully understand the travel demand, this paper conducted an investigation about the elderly, and obtained some basic information, and made qualitative analysis. Then this study designs the questionnaire and research direction based on the survey. The elders’ travel behavior are divided into two categories: daily travel and tourism travel. The characteristics of the two categories of two trips are very different. Through the study on the elderly daily travel characteristics, this study draws the following conclusion:As the growth of the age, old people tend to have simple single-purpose travel. The purpose of travelis related to make a living and meet the basic life needs of individual or family. The primary trip mode is walking. Travel distance is significantly shorter as the age growth. And the activity space is close to home. Compared to women, the men’s travel distance is further. Most of them have the travel purpose-leisure fitness. Meanwhile, women have more responsibility to the family shopping. Women walk to shop more than men. Solitary seniors have small trip distances compared to senior living with the family. At the same time, solitary seniors have more outdoor activities than the seniors living with family. The reason is people who live alone are more likely to be lonely and outdoor activities can reduce the loneliness of these people. All the analysis above shows that the elderly have strong willingness to travel every day, and the trip purpose is physical exercise Activity space of the elderly is scattered around residential area. The second primary trip purpose of the elderly is shopping and they shop one time every two days. shopping space as a distance attenuation law, way to travel is given priority to with walking.Through the research on the characteristics of tourism in the elderly, the paper reached the following conclusions:The main purpose of the elderly people’s travel is to enjoy the scenery, but the tourism expense is also very important for low income elderly people. Because of poor health, the elderly pay more attention to traffic and local safety. They paid the cost with their own and there is few other support. They obtained travel information from family, friends, television, networks and advertising agencies. Most elderly people choose to travel with tour group.III) An exploratory study on travel choice behavior of old people was made. The results show that age, gender, status of driver’s license, commutation ticket, number of bicycles and electric bicycles of the family, travel purpose, travel distance, travel time and other variables have important influence on travel mode choice Trip distance of people over the age of 75 is within 1 km. Shopping and entertainment are the most important purposes of the flexible travelers who prefer to travel on foot. These male with the age between 60 and 70, travel distance from 1 to 5 km, and with the purpose of seeing a doctor tend to choose public transit; the most important factor if the elderly chooses private car or not is whether the traveler has a driver’s license.IV) Based on the theory of push and pull motivations, it is concluded that the elderly travel motivation mainly has four main thrust common factors: "motivation that make up for the regret”, “motivation of love", "self-improvement motivation" and "the pursuit of beauty different perfect life"; And there are four pull motivation factors: "destination image", "housing security service", "natural and cultural resources" and "expenses and crowded degree". "Motivation that make up for the regret” and "destination image" are the main push pull motivation factors. In addition, T test and the results of single factor variance analysis showed that age, culture level, occupation, income level, living with family or not have significant influence on the elderly travelers’ motivation, and gender has no significant effect on the elderly push-pull motivation.V) This paper discusses the interaction mechanism between the elderly tourist behavior and subjective well-being of the elderly. Through the study on the relationship between travel motivations, satisfaction and subjective well-being, this paper draws a conclusion that the tourism motivation and pull thrust motivation has a significant positive impact on tourist satisfaction. Tourist satisfaction has positive effect on subjective well-being. Although the tourism motivation can directly lead to happiness, with intervene of tourist satisfaction, the effect is more obvious.Through the study on the relationship between the travel behavior and the life satisfaction which is the main indicators of subjective well-being, this paper gets the conclusion that life satisfaction has significant influence on some travel behavior. These travel behavior include tourist funding sources, travel information source, hindering factors of tourism and tourism promotion after happiness. Life satisfaction has no effect on the following behavior such as whether to travel every year, importance cognition of the tourism, the travel time and travel way.VI) Finally, based on the theory of planned behavior, with the study of the elderly participation in tourism of cognitive psychology, this paper discusses the current psychological status on travel attitude of the aged in China, as well as subjective norm and perceived behavioral control of travel and tourism intention of the elderly in China. Research shows that: the attitude of elderly toward tourism has no significant effect on tourism intention. Tourism, subjective norm and perceived behavioral control have significant positive impact on tourism intention. Tourist attitude, subjective norm and perceived behavioral control tourism have significant relevance between each other. Finally, the paper proposes some suggestions about travel of the elderly. |
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