Using social media images to assess ecosystem services in a remote protected area in the Argentinean Andes

Social media images are a novel source of data to assess how people view and value the environment. Access to these images is often free, the volume and spread of images is expanding rapidly and hence they are an increasingly valuable source of data complementing and expanding on other data. Recentl...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Ambio 2020-06, Vol.49 (6), p.1146-1160
Main Authors: Rossi, Sebastian Dario, Barros, Agustina, Walden-Schreiner, Chelsey, Pickering, Catherine
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Argentina
Asia
Atmospheric Sciences
Australia
Biodiversity
Conservation of Natural Resources
Digital media
Earth and Environmental Science
Ecology
Ecosystem
Ecosystem assessment
Ecosystem services
Environment
Environmental Engineering/Biotechnology
Environmental Management
Europe
Geology
Image coding
Mountains
National parks
Physical Geography
Protected areas
Provisioning
RESEARCH ARTICLE
Social Media
Social networks
South America
Southern Hemisphere
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Summary:Social media images are a novel source of data to assess how people view and value the environment. Access to these images is often free, the volume and spread of images is expanding rapidly and hence they are an increasingly valuable source of data complementing and expanding on other data. Recently, coding images has been used to assess sociocultural values relating to ecosystem services including those provided by national parks. To further explore the use of social media images, including for remote environments, we analysed the content of images posted to Flickr by people visiting a national park that contains the highest mountain in the southern hemisphere, Mt. Aconcagua, in Argentina, South America. The saliency of aesthetic landscapes, recreation, social relations and fresh-water provisioning was high across the 334 images posted to Flickr by 104 visitors to the Park, but location mattered. Images from visitors in easily accessible day-use areas were significantly more likely to include content that reflects biodiversityexistence, geology, culture and education services, while the content of images from remote areas was more likely to reflect social relations and fresh-water provision services. Comparisons of the content of images from Mt. Aconcagua with other studies in Europe, South America, Asia, Africa and Australia highlight similarities and differences in people’s views of the diversity of locations, but also the benefits and limitations of user-generated social media content when assessing environmental and management issues.
ISSN:0044-7447
1654-7209
DOI:10.1007/s13280-019-01268-w