Research on the Perception of Cultural Ecosystem Services in Urban Parks via Analyses of Online Comment Data

Urban parks are an important part of urban ecosystems and can provide beneficial cultural ecosystem services (CES) to urban residents. The integration of geospatial and online comment data and relevant data mining have become a mainstream approach to the research on CES perception. This paper takes 10 typical urban parks in the central districts of Jinan, China as examples, and collects park users' online comment data from tourism websites. Based on content analysis, high-frequency CES perception words and their perception frequencies are obtained to reveal the disparity of CES perception in different urban parks. FP-association rules are applied to examine the correlations between the perception of CES categories. Main findings are as follow. 1) Aesthetics and leisure/ecotourism services are the most easily perceived CES categories in urban parks. 2) There are differences in public's perception of CES categories in different urban parks: aesthetics service in Baihua Park and Wulongtan Park, leisure/ecotourism service in Jinan Forest Park, and education/knowledge service in Quancheng Park, Zhongshan Park, Huashan Lake Park, and Jinan Zoo can be better perceived by the public. And 3) the perception of CES categories of urban parks is correlated. Aesthetics and leisure/ecotourism services have the strongest correlation and are often perceived with the services of cultural heritage, spiritual/religious value, and artistic inspiration. The study enriches the empirical research on CES perception via analyses of online comment data, clarifies the patterns of public's CES perception in urban parks, and provides a scientific reference for the planning, design, and management of urban parks, showing a significance for improving CES supply and spatial quality of urban parks.