×
Home
2024 Conference
All Conferences
Instructions
TSVC | Tourism Students Virtual Conference

Disabilities and attitudes within Tourism

Disabilities and attitudes within Tourism
Author: Kelly Nuttell
1 Commentries
Abstract:

People with disabilities face a high number of barriers in the tourism industry and the main thing is they are being taken out of there comfort zone to what they are used to. The aim of this paper is to look at the barriers that are faced and what is in place and being put in place within the tourism industry in order to make sure that people with disabilities aren’t discriminated against because of this.

Keywords: Disabilities, Barriers & Tourism

Access to tourism- Disabilities and attitudes within tourism

Disability is a big thing today as there are so many people that have disabilities. There are different attitudes and views in society today of how people think about people with disabilities however there are always the rules and regulations that the tourism industry would have to follow in order to make sure that discrimination isn’t happening towards people wanting to travel if they have a disability and they would have to follow these thoroughly when dealing with people with disabilities. There is quite limited research on tourism and disability however it is always open for discussion as its a big thing in society now days.

There are several barriers that people with disabilities face when wanting to travel, how these are dealt with and the needs of the person met is down to how the tourism industry handles this and the way they would go around making sure the needs of the person is met. There are 4 categories that have been identified of the barriers that people with disabilities face.

“ There are barriers to tourism participation that are faced with persons with disability. The first category that is identified is Internal, Intrinsic barriers and these are seen as lack of knowledge, ineffective social skills which include health related barriers, physical and psychological related barriers which includes is travel seen as right for persons with disabilities. The second category that is identified is internal, economic barriers, this includes affordability and income disparities which includes the need for travel companions and special facilities. The third category that is identified is exogenous, environmental barriers such as architectural barriers which include accessibility of accommodation, ecological barriers which include paths, trails and hills, transport, rules and regulations and safety. The last category that is identified if exogenous, interactive barriers which are skills and challenges faced, communication challenges, lack of encouragement to participate, attitudes of travel and hospitality industry workers and the availability and accuracy if information to persons with disability.” (Smith (1987), Murray and Sproats (1990), Patching (1990), Muloin (1992), Kaufman (1995), Darcy (1998), and Anon (1997).

The Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) 1995 is the main factor that stops discrimination happening towards disabled travellers and this has raised attention in both political and economic perspectives of disabled people. This is in place to make sure that the service providers and the tourism industry follow all procedures to make sure that there isn’t any discrimination happening towards people wanting to travel with disabilities. This act being in place makes it illegal for all service providers within the travel industry including service providers, attractions and the accommodation establishments to discriminate. Since the disability discrimination act became law in 1996 there is three main parts to it that have been developed and phased in since coming into play. Part three of the legislation holds the major implications for the tourism industry and this came into play in 2004. This means that all service providers should now have taken all the reasonable measures to make sure that their premises are now in the right order to accommodate people with disabilities.
For tourism this means that the implications put in place are significant and that all the physical barriers that deny access to people with disabilities need to be removed or modified in order for everything to be in place for them.

Looking at disabilities and the tourism sector there has been a lot of improvements made and things put in place in order for tourists to travel without disruptions because of being disabled. The Disability Discrimination Act played a big part in these changes being made and with this in place it means that a person travelling with a disability cannot be discriminated against and they will have the best experience that they deserve. The tourism industry is a popular industry and there is no reason to why someone with a disability should miss out on the opportunities that a person without a disability would have because of they are. Making it easier for disabled traveller to travel is good for the tourism industry as it means that they will continue to have repeat customers and they aren’t going to lose that as long as they make sure they follow the rules and regulations in place. Whilst there are things in place it could be argued that there could be more things done for disabled travellers and I am sure disabled travellers would have ideas and ways to continue to do this.

Antonak, R., & Livneh, H. (1988). The measurement of attitudes toward people with disabilities. Springfield, IL: Charles C. Thomas. Chamberlain, M. (1998). Changing attitudes to disability in hospitals. The Lancet, 351, 771–772.

Tourism for all (2013) About TFA Available: http://www.tourismforall.org.uk/About-TFA.html.

Visit england A strategic action plan for accessibility in tourism (2010-2020) available- http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&frm=1&source=web&cd=4&ved=0CFAQFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.visitengland.org%2FImages%2FFINALAccessibility%2520Action%2520Plan_tcm30-32562.pdf&ei=T3ZFU6i8DeTY7Abd-YBQ&usg=AFQjCNEhuDuR3_sZa9axRFDm2zU7yJIr5w

Barriers to Disabled People
Author: Lucy Richards
The main reason why I have chosen this paper to discuss and evaluate was due to the fact that this paper contains similar issues that I have discussed in my paper, with the main focus being on how people who have disabilities face a number of barriers in the tourism industry. This paper goes into detail on the barriers that have been identified that affect people with disabilities and it also concludes by discussing the changes that have been put in place to ensure disabled people are able to participate in the tourism industry.

The main area of this paper that interested me was that it discusses in great depth about the barriers that affect people with disabilities and how these barriers have been identified and spilt into four main categories; intrinsic barriers, economic barriers, environmental barriers and interactive barriers. It is interesting to read that all people who are disabled suffer from barriers at a similar level and the barriers range from a number of different issues including; communication challenges, special facilities required, affordability, lack of knowledge and accessibility of accommodation.

The main similarity of this conference paper and my conference paper is that there are a number of barriers that affected people who are disabled, and this paper stressed the importance that even though people are disabled they should be able to participate in the tourism industry, this can be seen through the Disability Discrimination Act (DDA) 1995 which is a company that stops discrimination happening toward disabled travellers. Both of our papers have discussed changes that have been made or improvements that could be recommended that could help improve access to the tourism industry for disabled people.

The main difference between this conference paper and my conference paper is that this paper discusses how there are barriers that affect all types of disabilities and how the Disability Discrimination Act play a key role in improving the access for people with disabilities whilst my conference paper focuses on the barriers that affect people who are visually impaired.

Overall this discussion paper is well structured, clear on the issues that it is portraying, and discusses and evaluates the main barriers that affect people who are disabled access to tourism in a detailed way. However a limitation of this paper is that there is only a small discussion on what changes have been put in place to improve the access to tourism overall, more detail is required to express the importance that changes are starting to be made.



Reference

- Antonak, R., & Livneh, H. (1988). The measurement of attitudes toward people with disabilities. Springfield, IL: Charles C. Thomas. Chamberlain, M. (1998). Changing attitudes to disability in hospitals. The Lancet, 351, 771–772.