Tourism seasonality in cultural destinations: Empirical evidence from Sicily Tiziana Cuccia * , Ilde Rizzo University of Catania, Corso Italia 55, 95129 Catania, Italy article info Article history: Received 21 October 2009 Accepted 8 May 2010 Keywords: Cultural tourism Heritage Seasonality Census-X12-Arima abstract Seasonality is one of the main phenomena affecting tourism. It depends on the characteristics of both tourism demand and tourism destinations in terms of location and services supplied. This paper focuses on a particular aspect of tourism supply: the cultural attractiveness of tourism destinations, and aims to evaluate the role of cultural tourism in tourism seasonality. We analyze the seasonality of tourist pres- ence in different destinations in Sicily, selected according to their different degree of cultural attrac- tiveness. The methodology adopted to measure seasonality is based on a regression analysis approach, using the Census-X12-Arima procedure. Results are discussed and some policy implications are derived. Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Seasonality is one of the main aspects affecting tourism. In economic terms, generally speaking, seasonality consists in the systematic, although not necessarily regular, movement of a vari- able in a selected period of time, usually the year (Hylleberg, 1992). In the case of tourism, seasonality can be defined as “the temporal imbalance in the phenomenon of tourism, which may be expressed in terms of dimensions of such elements as numbers of visitors, expenditure of visitors, traffic on highways and other forms of transportation, employment and admissions to attractions” (Butler, 1994, p. 332). The number of tourists e that is, the arrivals or the presence of tourists e is a measure of the quantitative dimension of the demand, while their expenditures measure the economic value of the demand for the tourism destination. Moreover, the atten- dance at local attractions e e.g., events, festival and, above all, cultural sites e measures the attractiveness of these private and/or public cultural services that are complementary to the tourism sector. We can distinguish different causes of seasonality in tourism: natural causes, which are beyond the control of decision-makers (climatic factors such as temperature, sunlight, rainfall), and insti- tutional causes, a combination of religious, social and cultural factors, which are partially under the control of the decision- makers (i.e. the schedule of school holidays; the planning and scheduling of festivals or cultural events in tourism destinations; the planning of the urban public and private services supply) (Bar-On, 1975, 1999). The bandwagon effect or fashion behavior and the persistence of individual preferences or love for tradition can also influence individual preference for the peak season. A favor- able climatic factor could be a necessary but not sufficient condition to avoid seasonality in tourism. Some Mediterranean (or even tropical) “sun-and-sea” destinations like Sicily have their peak season in summer where seaside tourism can be practiced, but suffer in the rest of the year, even if their climate is favorable. Even if the seasonality of the tourism demand changes quite slowly, the patterns of a given tourism destination’s seasonality may change over time according to the life cycle of the destination. The seasonality of a new tourism destination can be different from the seasonality of a mature tourism site (see the analysis of the Balearic Islands, in Rossellò-Nadal, Riera Font, & Rossello, 2004). The presence of new competitors must be taken into account by policy-makers that have to choose between competing with the new entrants on price, in the same tourism season, or on quality, looking for new seasons and new segments of demand (see, for instance Koc & Altinay, 2007). Seasonality has economic effects in terms of private and social costs that usually largely exceed the few benefits. The private costs are paid by each of the agents involved: private producers, final consumers and workers. Private producers (i.e. hotels, restaurants) yield a lower return on the capital invested if their investments are tailored to the peak-season demand, suffering from a high level of under-exploited capacity and fixed costs in the off-seasons. The final consumers of the destination e both tourists and residents e pay higher prices for any kind of product and service they buy in the peak season. The workers of the tourism sector typically accept seasonal jobs, without the usual protection required by labor contracts, and long periods of unemployment. However, under certain circumstances, tourism seasonality can produce some * Corresponding author. Faculty of Economics, University of Catania, Corso Italia, 55, 95129 Catania, Italy. Tel.: þ39 095 7537741; fax: þ39 095 7537510. E-mail addresses: cucciati@unict.it (T. Cuccia), rizzor@unict.it (I. Rizzo). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Tourism Management journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/tourman 0261-5177/$ e see front matter Ó 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.tourman.2010.05.008 Tourism Management 32 (2011) 589e595