Investigating the Role of Rural Tourism in Economic Development of Tourist Target Villages (Case Study: Modares Villages, Shushtar County)

The tourism industry plays an important role in the economies of countries. Meanwhile, rural areas are facing problems such as rural migration, low income levels, growing poverty, and so on. Rural tourism and tourism economy is becoming one of the main pillars of economic development and in this regard, rural tourism with proper planning and recognition of opportunities and constraints can play an important role in rural development and diversification of the national economy. Have. The purpose of this study is to investigate the role of rural tourism in the economic development of tourist target villages (Case study: villages of Modares district, Shushtar city). This research is of descriptive-analytical type which has been used by survey method and library. The statistical population in this study includes villagers living in rural areas of Modares district of Shushtar city. According to the 1395 census, it has a population of 1259 people and 361 households. In the studied statistical population, Cochran's formula was used and the sample size was equal to 294.43 and for more accuracy, the sample size was 295. Cronbach's alpha coefficient was used to determine the quantitative reliability of the questionnaire. The alpha value for different parts of the questionnaire was calculated from 0.72 to 0.80. In order to obtain residents' views on the mentioned components, statistical tests of mean responses and variance and one-sample t-test were used. The results showed that there is a significant relationship between rural tourism and the economic components of the study. The most important role of rural tourism in the economic development of rural areas is as follows: income component with an average (-1.54) has the most impact and employment component with an average (-1/10) has the least impact of rural tourism.