Tourism is not detached from all the unceasing changes that take place in the world. These changes lead to adaptive responses that explain transformation at the individual level and evolution at the collective level. They have been studied in a particularly precise way by Developmental Psychology and Integral Theory. This paper will apply to tourism the findings of these fields to propose a model of the Evolution of Tourist Consciousness (ETC). The ETC model proposes a typology of 4 levels of tourist consciousness that shows how tourists and tourism have evolved through four stages: (1) the traditional premodern tourist, (2) the modern hedonistic tourist, (3) the experiential postmodern tourist, and (4) the transformational metamodern tourist. Each typology shows different worldviews, values, priorities, motivations, and behaviour at an individual level and correlates with the sociocultural evolution of the whole industry. A comparative analysis reveals that this evolution is characterized by a progressive increase in consciousness. As consciousness grows, tourists become more awake, they better understand the consequences of their actions thus acting more responsibly, their thinking grows in complexity, their circle of care widens, they are more interested in their personal development and transformation, and they become more profound and spiritual.
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