Differences in Visual and Cultural Perception among Different Tourist Groups in Traditional Village Landscapes: Evidence from an Eye-Tracking Experiment

<title>Abstract</title> <p> Traditional village landscape is a key heritage space that presents regional culture and historical memory, which can provide visual perception and cultural perception and create the visitor experience context for tourists. This study uses an Eye-Tracking Experiment and questionnaires to explore the differences in landscape perception between professional tourists and non-professional tourists, covering five spatial types: edge space, path space, node space, district space, and landmark space. Significant differences were found between the two groups in visual perception and cultural perception, and the statistics reached a significant level ( <italic>p</italic>  &lt; 0.05).Professional tourists perform excellently in both evaluation dimensions, which implies that their professional background may have an impact on their perspective of observing and interpreting the traditional village landscape. There is a significant correlation among Cultural Perception (Y1), Perception of Artistic Conception (Y2), and Sense of Place Perception (Y3), which reveals the close connection among cultural perception, perception of artistic conception, and sense of place perception. Visual perception is mainly related to spatial structure, visual guidance, and landscape saliency, while cultural perception is deeply involved in the creation of traditional architectural character, native vegetation, cultural symbols, and the historical and cultural atmosphere. Significant differences are also presented in visual attention and cultural perception of different spatial types. The results provide further insights into visitor experiences of traditional village landscapes and may provide implications for cultural heritage conservation, cultural interpretation, and landscape renewal practices. </p>