Skip to content Skip to navigation
University of Warwick
  • Study
  • |
  • Research
  • |
  • Business
  • |
  • Alumni
  • |
  • News
  • |
  • About

University of Warwick
Publications service & WRAP

Highlight your research

  • WRAP
    • Home
    • Search WRAP
    • Browse by Warwick Author
    • Browse WRAP by Year
    • Browse WRAP by Subject
    • Browse WRAP by Department
    • Browse WRAP by Funder
    • Browse Theses by Department
  • Publications Service
    • Home
    • Search Publications Service
    • Browse by Warwick Author
    • Browse Publications service by Year
    • Browse Publications service by Subject
    • Browse Publications service by Department
    • Browse Publications service by Funder
  • Help & Advice
University of Warwick

The Library

  • Login
  • Admin

Sensing global tourism numbers with millions of publicly shared online photographs

Tools
- Tools
+ Tools

Preis, Tobias, Botta, Federico and Moat, Helen Susannah (2020) Sensing global tourism numbers with millions of publicly shared online photographs. Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space, 52 (3). pp. 471-477. 0308518X1987277. doi:10.1177/0308518X19872772

[img]
Preview
PDF
WRAP-sensing-global-tourism-numbers-millions-online-photographs-Preis-2019.pdf - Published Version - Requires a PDF viewer.
Available under License Creative Commons Attribution 4.0.

Download (11Mb) | Preview
Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0308518X19872772

Request Changes to record.

Abstract

In our increasingly connected world, individuals produce continuous streams of data through their constant interactions with the Internet. This data is opening up opportunities to measure human behaviour that was previously time consuming or expensive to capture. Here, we explore whether data from online photographs can be used to estimate travel statistics on a global scale. We draw on the locations attached to 69 million publicly shared photographs to infer the global travel patterns of almost half a million users of the photo-sharing platform Flickr. We find that our photo-based estimates of tourist arrival statistics for the G7 countries Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States correlate with the corresponding official statistics released by those countries. Our results highlight the potential for vast volumes of online data to inform the generation of timely, low-cost indicators of the state of society. We discuss practical considerations that remain before this methodology could be used in the production of official statistics.

Item Type: Journal Article
Subjects: G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > G Geography (General)
H Social Sciences > HA Statistics
H Social Sciences > HM Sociology
P Language and Literature > P Philology. Linguistics
T Technology > TA Engineering (General). Civil engineering (General)
T Technology > TR Photography
Divisions: Faculty of Social Sciences > Warwick Business School > Behavioural Science
Faculty of Social Sciences > Warwick Business School
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): Social media , Tourism, Online social networks -- Communication, Human behavior -- Data processing, Image processing -- Digital techniques -- Data processing, Visual communication -- Social aspects, Photography -- Digital techniques, Tourists -- Statistics
Journal or Publication Title: Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space
Publisher: SAGE Publications Ltd.
ISSN: 0308-518X
Official Date: 1 May 2020
Dates:
DateEvent
1 May 2020Published
11 September 2019Available
6 August 2019Accepted
Volume: 52
Number: 3
Page Range: pp. 471-477
Article Number: 0308518X1987277
DOI: 10.1177/0308518X19872772
Status: Peer Reviewed
Publication Status: Published
Access rights to Published version: Open Access
RIOXX Funder/Project Grant:
Project/Grant IDRIOXX Funder NameFunder ID
UNSPECIFIEDGreat Britain.‏ ‎Government Office for Sciencehttp://viaf.org/viaf/155030438
TU/B/000008 (TP) Alan Turing Institutehttp://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100012338
TU/B/000006 (HSM)Alan Turing Institutehttp://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100012338
EP/N510129/1 [EPSRC] Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Councilhttp://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000266
UNSPECIFIEDUniversity of Warwickhttp://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000741
ES/M500434/1[ESRC] Economic and Social Research Councilhttp://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000269

Request changes or add full text files to a record

Repository staff actions (login required)

View Item View Item

Downloads

Downloads per month over past year

View more statistics

twitter

Email us: wrap@warwick.ac.uk
Contact Details
About Us