Perceptions of Cultural Ecosystem Services in Urban Parks Based on Social Network Data

Abstract

The value of a cultural ecosystem service depends on the perception of different cultural service categories. However, the data sources used in research on the perception of cultural service have limitations that mainly depend on social investigation, leading to slow progress in cultural service evaluation. With the advent of the era of network big data, social media provides a new data source for the study of cultural ecosystem service perception, so that the study of these services is expected to make new breakthroughs. Using search crawler software, this paper reviewed 7257 online comments related to 19 city parks in Xuzhou City, China. With the help of Rost Content mining semantic analysis software, the comment sentences were divided into keywords, and the Delphi expert method was used to classify these keywords. Thus, a cultural service perception database was established. Through statistical analysis, with the help of ArcGIS software, various cultural services were analyzed. The results showed that (1) the cultural services of urban parks could be divided into seven types (i.e., aesthetics, recreation, sports, inspiration, education, cultural heritage, and spiritual satisfaction) using social network comment data. (2) High-frequency keywords of online comment data can serve as the core basis during an analysis of the perception of cultural services by visitors of city parks. However, a large gap exists in the number of high frequency keywords in different parks. For example, Yunlong Lake Park has 2887 keywords, while Kuaizai Ting Park has only 33. (3) Differences exist in the perception of cultural service in urban parks, the park’s scale, and characteristics determine the visitor’s cultural service perception level. The aesthetic and recreation types were the most easily perceived, and 68% and 63% parks have the above two perceptual records, respectively. Therefore, the social media comment data has the ability to document perception of each park’s cultural service type and its differences, which can serve as the cultural ecosystem service perception as well as the valuation data source, to supplement the social investigation.

Too Old for Recreation? How Friendly Are Urban Parks for Elderly People?

“…Urban parks are important elements of city infrastructure, providing numerous and diverse functions and benefits. A not exhaustive list includes positive impacts on health and wellbeing, through recreation, leisure, and sport activities [1]; community development, sense of place, identity, and social cohesion, through cultural activities and providing space and occasion for social interaction and mutual understanding [2]; education, as people can discover plants, animals and natural phenomena or use parks as outdoor classrooms [3]; the economy, as the presence of parks generates investment opportunities, attracts customers, including tourists [4], and increases the price of properties in the vicinity [5,6]; ecosystem functioning, through a range of ecosystem services, from biodiversity conservation to resource production [7], improving air quality (absorbing pollutants, regulating humidity) [8], carbon sequestration, water management (storm water absorption, and run off regulation), and mitigating urban heat islands [9].…”

“…Our study focuses on the use of urban parks and aims to analyze how friendly their planning, design, and use are for elderly people. The objectives of the study are (1) assessing the planning of urban parks in relation with elderly people needs and (2) comparing the behavior and perception of elderly people visiting urban parks with those of other groups of visitors.…”

A Model for the Economic Evaluation of Cultural Ecosystem Services: The Recreational Hunting Function in the Agroforestry Territories of Tuscany (Italy)

“…Ungulate game hunting, migratory game hunting and sedentary game hunting (i.e., hares, pheasants and partridges), typical of the entire national territory, are practised in these places. It was decided to focus the investigation on a purely agroforest area to fill a gap in sectoral research, namely the fact that "the literature on the valuation of cultural ecosystem services is disproportionately located in urban areas" [11] with particular reference to the themes of urban parks [2,10,52,53]. This may be due to the fact that CESs in urban areas are characterised by a form of more direct experience and a more immediate visibility than those experienced in recreational practices in agroforestry contexts [11].…”

“…is disproportionately located in urban areas" [11] with particular reference to the themes of urban parks [2,10,52,53]. This may be due to the fact that CESs in urban areas are characterised by a form of more direct experience and a more immediate visibility than those experienced in recreational practices in agroforestry contexts [11].…”

“…Additionally, CESs have also been defined as all spaces in the environment and all cultural practices that generate benefits for people [9]. Even though different names have been used to define CESs [10], most authors agree that they are an interdependent function between people and environment [11,12].…”