Farmers’ Perception of Tourism in Sustainable Development of Forests and Their Decisions in China: The Sustainability of the Prism Model and SEM Model

The sustainable development of forests involves a combination of environmental protection and economics. Ecotourism is a new and growing sustainable economic model for forests, compared with the traditional utilization and protection of forests. The purpose of this study was to explore the applicability of the Prism model and SEM model in seeking to understand farmers’ perceptions and decision-making regarding tourism, so as to fully understand farmers’ thinking and behavior around forest tourism, and to truly make them in harmony with the sustainable development of forests. In this study, based on a field investigation of 392 farmers living in 11 national forest parks in Jiangxi Province, China, three hypotheses were constructed using the SEM model; and then six first-level indicators and 15 s-level indicators were constructed based on the Prism model, to verify the cognition and influencing factors for farmers, regarding sustainable forest tourism. The results showed that (1) the formation process of farmers’ willingness to adapt to forest tourism follows the path of “individual cognition → individual behavior”. (2) Economic influences, social culture, environmental cognition, and institutional cognition all have significant positive effects on their adaptive willingness. (3) Farmers’ cognition of economic life, environmental protection, and social culture lead to significant differences in their cognition and adaptability to forest tourism. These findings highlight the importance of the perceived value of tourism in assessing how tourism develops, as well as whether it is sustainable for the forest and its impacts. This study provides a better understanding of the factors that influence farmers’ attitudes towards tourism and highlights the importance of valuing local communities as important players in sustainable development, especially as this boosts the economy in forests.