Reading the Factors Affecting the Wayfinding Behavior of Urban Tourists Using Meta-Synthesis

The use of urban routes by tourists is an integral part of tourism in urban spaces, and tourists use urban routes to reach their desired destinations. Confusion in wayfinding causes unpleasant feelings and facilitates wayfinding, providing tourist satisfaction and repeat visits. Despite importance of issues related to tourists' behavior in urban spaces, there is a lack of research that examines all factors affecting tourists' wayfinding behavior in tourist cities and provides a comprehensive understanding of wayfinding of tourism. Therefore, current research has its main mission and goal in contributing to body of knowledge in field of studies of tourists' wayfinding behavior and identifying all factors affecting this behavior in urban space for fill this research gap and planning and designing an efficient wayfinding system, according to the tourists' wayfinding behavior. This research is fundamental in terms of its purpose and seeks to answer the question, what are factors affecting wayfinding behavior of urban tourists? To answer research question, meta-synthesis method and seven-step model of Sandelowski and Barroso (2007) have been used. The target texts were coded in Maxqda 10. According to obtained results, tourism wayfinding is a complex activity due to limited familiarity of tourists with environment and different perception and depends on many factors. Facilitating tourist wayfinding requires attention to 5 main categories of travel factors, tourist characteristics, perceptual factors, environmental factors and guide tools. Findings of this research can be used to understand wayfinding behavior of tourists and improve wayfinding environment and travel experience and satisfaction of tourists.