Novelty of a vacation destination. Many tourists choose a vacation destination based on the newness or uniqueness (i.e., the novelty) of the itinerary. Texas A&M University professor J. Petrick investigated the relationship between novelty and vacationing golfers’ demographics (Annals of Tourism Research, Vol. 29, 2002). Data were obtained from a mail survey of 393 golf vacationers to a large coastal resort in southeastern United States. Several measures of novelty level (on a numerical scale) were obtained for each vacationer, including ‘‘change from routine,’’ ‘‘thrill,’’ ‘‘boredom-alleviation,’’ and ‘‘surprise.’’ The researcher employed four independent variables in a regression model to predict each of the novelty measures. The independent variables were x₁ = number of rounds of golf per year, x₂ = total number of golf vacations taken, x₃ = number of years played golf, and x4 = average golf score.

 

(a) Give the hypothesized equation of a first-order model for y = change from routine.

 

(b) A test of H₀: β₃ = 0 versus H_a: β₃

 

(c) The estimate of β₃ was found to be negative. Based on this result (and the result of part b), the researcher concluded that ‘‘those who have played golf for more years are less apt to seek change from their normal routine in their golf vacations.’’ Do you agree with this statement? Explain.

 

(d) The regression results for the three other dependent novelty measures are summarized in the table below. Give the null hypothesis for testing the overall adequacy of each first-order regression model.

 

 

(e) Give the rejection region for the test, part d, using α = .01.

 

(f) Use the test statistics reported in the table and the rejection region from part e to conduct the test for each of the dependent measures of novelty.

 

(g) Verify that the p-values in the table support your conclusions in part f.

(h) Interpret the values of R² reported in the table