Examining the moderator role of gender in the relationships between motivations and enduring involvement of tourists in adventure sports activities

Due to the importance of understanding the diverse motivations of sports tourists, this study aimed to investigate the moderator role of gender in the relationships between motivations and enduring involvement of tourists in adventure sports activities. The research method was descriptive - correlational and has been done by structural equation modeling approach. Using sample size software based on the statistical power of 0.80, and the alpha level of 0.01, the population of this study, 325 sports tourists in Ramsar city was selected by simple random sampling method. In the present study to evaluate each of the variables (motivations and enduring involvement) by questionnaire from Beckman's dissertation (2013) was used that its face and content validity was approved after a three-stage translation confirmed by 6 marketing and sports tourism experts. In addition, composite reliability indices, Cronbach's alpha, Fornel and Larker criteria and Average Variance Extracted (AVE) were used to assess the reliability of questionnaires, internal consistency of questions, divergent and convergent validity for each of the factors respectively. Based on findings from among the dimensions considered in explaining the motivations of sports tourists on their enduring involvement, with the moderator role of gender, the only hypothesis of the effect of nature factor on tourists' self-expression was not approved in both groups (male and female). Therefore, to marketers and officials of sports and recreational centers, it is recommended in order to attract more sports tourists, in their services, consider the diversity of motivations for male and female tourists.