TY - JOUR
T1 - Crowding in marine environments
T2 - Divers and whale watchers in the Azores
AU - Bentz, Julia
AU - Rodrigues, António
AU - Dearden, Philip
AU - Calado, Helena
AU - Lopes, Fernando
N1 - WOS:000353086200008
PY - 2015/6/1
Y1 - 2015/6/1
N2 - Increasing numbers of visitors in marine environments have resulted in a growing importance of social impact understanding such as crowding. This study examines perceived crowding of divers and whale watching tourists in the Azores. Reported encounters and encounter norms for both whale watching boats and divers were studied and minimum acceptable conditions for both activities determined. Perceived crowding was not correlated to specialization of users and only impacted the overall satisfaction of divers. The satisfaction of whale watchers was not altered through perceived crowding. Environmental impacts were not perceived differently by participants reporting different levels of crowding. The five different case study islands showed different levels of crowding. Management interventions to contribute to sustainable and satisfactory marine wildlife experiences include spatial zoning, achieving higher compliance with existing regulations, improved educational and awareness programs and limiting the number of divers at some dive sites.
AB - Increasing numbers of visitors in marine environments have resulted in a growing importance of social impact understanding such as crowding. This study examines perceived crowding of divers and whale watching tourists in the Azores. Reported encounters and encounter norms for both whale watching boats and divers were studied and minimum acceptable conditions for both activities determined. Perceived crowding was not correlated to specialization of users and only impacted the overall satisfaction of divers. The satisfaction of whale watchers was not altered through perceived crowding. Environmental impacts were not perceived differently by participants reporting different levels of crowding. The five different case study islands showed different levels of crowding. Management interventions to contribute to sustainable and satisfactory marine wildlife experiences include spatial zoning, achieving higher compliance with existing regulations, improved educational and awareness programs and limiting the number of divers at some dive sites.
KW - Diving
KW - Marine wildlife tourism
KW - Perceived crowding
KW - Social norms
KW - Sustainable management
KW - Tourism management
KW - Whale watching
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U2 - 10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2015.03.001
DO - 10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2015.03.001
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84924565988
SN - 0964-5691
VL - 109
SP - 77
EP - 85
JO - Ocean & Coastal Management
JF - Ocean & Coastal Management
ER -