ABSTRACT

The study determines the influence of information communication technology (ICT) and tourism development in Abia State (A case study of National War Museum Umuahia). Specifically, the study sought to determine the effects of social media applications on tourist choice of destination in Abia State, effects of internet application on tourist choice of destination in Abia State, effects of mobile technology on tourists choice of destination in Abia State and effects of computer usage on tourist choice of destination in Abia state. Four research questions and four hypotheses guided the study. The literature reviewed for this study was under the following subheadings: conceptual framework, theoretical frameworks, empirical studies and summary of literature reviewed. A descriptive survey design was adopted for the study. The study was carried out in National War Museum Umuahia. The population of the study comprised of 120 respondents made up 15 staff of National War Museum and 105 guest of the War Museum in the study area. The instrument for data collection was a structured questionnaire developed by the researcher. The reliability result of 0.74 was obtained as the result of the overall reliability of the instrument which indicated that the items were reliable. The data was analyzed using mean and Standard Deviation (SD) for research questions 1-4 while t-test was used to analyzed the hypotheses at 0.05 level of significance. The results revealed that the respondents agreed that the 21 items were the influence of Information Communication Technology (ICT) on tourism development in Nigeria. Therefore, the null hypothesis of no significant effects was rejected in all the items tested. The researcher recommended among other things, that the effects of social media applications on tourist choice of destination in Abia State should be re-examined on the aspect of negative side of it.