The Instagram Effect: Is Social Media Influencing Visitation to Public Lands?

Ashley Lowe Mackenzie; Steven J. Dundas; Bo Zhao

doi:10.3368/le.100.2.122920-0192R1

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Figure 1
National and Regional Headlines on the Connection between Social Media and Increasing Visitation to Public Lands
Sources: 1 = Solomon (2017); 2 = Garcia-Navarro (2017); 3 = Alvarez (2018); 4 = Simmonds et al. (2018); 5 = Holson (2018); 6 = Wastradowski (2019).
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Figure 2
Map of Oregon State Parks
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Figure 3
Timing of Instagram Content and Engagement and Activity Levels by Park: (a) Geotagged Content and Influential Posts in the 90th Percentile over Time; (b) Instagram Activity for All Geotagged Content Associated with Analyzed Parks
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Figure 4
Trends in Visitation by Park Group Based on Instagram User Activity

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Table 1

Descriptive Statistics for 44 Oregon State Park Locations

Variable	N (1)	Mean (2)	SD (3)	Min. (4)	Max. (5)
Panel A. Visits per Month
Pre-Instagram
(Jan. 2002–Sep. 2010)	4,342	29,862	33,459	30	305,112
Post-Instagram
(Oct. 2010–Aug. 2019)	4,501	33,391	37,670	42	297,668
Panel B. Full Data (Jan. 2002–Aug. 2019)
Visits per month	8,843	31,658	35,706	30	305,112
Mean precipitation (in.)	8,843	0.149	0.158	0	1.285
Max temperature (°F)	8,843	60.62	12.05	24.81	97.96
Unemployment rate (%)	8,843	6.841	2.143	3.300	11.30
Average housing price ($)	8,843	221,769	38,889	154,082	299,160
Gas prices ($)	8,843	2.99	0.742	1.23	4.42
Oregon population	8,843	3,829,000	210,180	3,472,000	4,215,000
Panel C. High-Activity Parks: Post-Instagram Launch (Oct. 2010)
Visits per month	426	66,216	48,496	3,874	288,414
Geotagged content uploads	426	387.9	629	0	3,845
Influential posts top 90th	426	50	100	0	573
Cumulative top 90th	426	1,237	2,689	0	13,516
Influential posts top 95th	426	27	54	0	344
Cumulative top 95th	426	680	1,462	0	7,351
Panel D. Low-Activity Parks: Post-Instagram Launch (Oct. 2010)
Visits per month	4,075	29,960	34,606	42	297,668
Geotagged content uploads	4,075	31	78	0	876
Influential posts top 90th	4,075	2	7	0	117
Cumulative top 90th	4,075	47	141	0	1,426
Influential posts top 95th	4,075	1	4	0	71
Cumulative top 95th	4,075	21	71	0	698
Panel E. Park Amenities

	N	Amenities^a	Activity Amenities^b	Scenery Amenities^c
High activity	4	11.8	6.5	2.5
Low activity	40	11.8	7.5	1.6

Note: High-activity parks include Smith Rock, Oswald West, Ecola, and Silver Falls.

↵a These include bathrooms, vault toilets, a dump station, portable water, and scenery- and activity-based amenities.
↵b These include camping, hiking, biking, kayaking, fishing, wind surfing, climbing, surfing, swimming, horses, a playground, a boat ramp, picnicking, a cabin, yurts, yurts with dogs, exhibit information, tepees, an amphitheater, disc golf, and tours.
↵c These suggest scenic views and photogenic locations that are listed as viewpoints, beach access, wildlife, and waterfalls. Park-specific summary statistics pre- and post-Instagram are shown in Appendix Tables A1 and A2.

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Table 2

Results for State Park Visitation Models

Log(Monthly Visits)	Instagram Launch (1)	Instagram Use (2)	Difference-in-Differences (3)
Instagram launch (Oct. 2010)	−0.042
	(0.038)
Instagram sustained use (Apr. 2012)		0.013	−0.007
		(0.040)	(0.039)
Instagram use × high-activity parks			0.216^***
			(0.069)
Economic controls	Y	Y	Y
Weather controls	Y	Y	Y
Year fixed effects	Y	Y	Y
Month fixed effects	Y	Y	Y
N	8,843	8,843	8,843
R-squared	0.582	0.586	0.588

Note: The panel model includes 44 parks in the Oregon state park system. Instagram launch = 1 for all observations after its launch in October 2010. Instagram use = 1 for all observations after April 2012 when Instagram images began being geotagged to Oregon state parks. The difference-in-differences approach separates parks into high Instagram activity and low Instagram activity. There are four high-activity parks: Smith Rock, Silver Falls, Oswald West, and Ecola. All specifications include the economic controls of gas prices, housing prices, unemployment rate, and population levels. Weather controls include mean monthly precipitation and a nonlinear function of daily weather in each month. The panel is unbalanced, as there are a few parks that are closed in winter and a few cases of missing monthly visitation data owing to random malfunctions of car counters. Robust standard errors are in parentheses. The full model results are in Appendix Table A4.

* p < 0.1;
** p < 0.05;
↵*** p < 0.01.

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Table 3

Results for Visitation Models Using Instagram Content and Engagement

	Content (1)	Content: High / Low (2)	Content: High / Low + Engagement (90%) (3)	Content: High / Low + Engagement (95%) (4)	Content: High / Low + Engagement by Year (90%) (5)	Content: High / Low + Engagement by Year (95%) (6)
Instagram launch	−0.046	−0.048	−0.049	−0.048	−0.048	−0.048
	(0.038)	(0.038)	(0.038)	(0.038)	(0.038)	(0.038)
Content variable
No. geotags	0.0002^***
	(6.26e-05)
No. geotags high-activity parks		0.0002^***	0.00009^*	0.00009^*	0.00008	0.00008
No. geotags high-activity parks		(5.40e-05)	(4.81e-05)	(5.01e-05)	(4.67e-05)	(4.90e-05)
No. geotags low-activity parks		0.0003	0.0005	0.0005	0.0004	0.0005
No. geotags low-activity parks		(0.0003)	(0.0003)	(0.0003)	(0.0003)	(0.0003)
Engagement variable
Cumulative nos. 90th percentile (high-activity parks)			0.00003^***		0.00003^***
Cumulative nos. 90th percentile (high-activity parks)			(6.33e-06)		(7.33e-06)
Cumulative nos. 90th percentile (low-activity parks)			−0.0001		−0.00006
Cumulative nos. 90th percentile (low-activity parks)			(0.0002)		(0.0002)
Cumulative nos. 95th percentile (high-activity parks)				0.00005^***		0.00006^***
Cumulative nos. 95th percentile (high-activity parks)				(1.06e-05)		(1.23e-05)
Cumulative nos. 90th percentile posts (low-activity parks)				−0.0002		−0.0002
Cumulative nos. 90th percentile posts (low-activity parks)				(0.0003)		(0.0004)
Economic controls	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y
Weather controls	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y
Year fixed effects	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y
Month fixed effects	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y
N	8,843	8,843	8,843	8,843	8,843	8,843
R-squared	0.587	0.587	0.588	0.588	0.588	0.588

Note: The panel model includes 44 parks in the Oregon state park system. Instgram launch = 1 for all observations after its launch in October 2010. There are four high-activity parks: Smith Rock, Silver Falls, Oswald West, and Ecola. Economic controls include gas prices, housing prices, unemployment rate, and population levels. The cumulative number of 90th and 95th posts (columns (3) and (4)) are designated by the likes received (135 and 209 likes) on the entire set of geotagged photos. The cumulative number of 90th and 95th by year (columns (5) and (6)) are designated by likes on set of geotags per year (online Appendix Table A3). Weather controls include mean monthly precipitation and a nonlinear function of daily weather in each month. The panel is unbalanced, as there are a few parks that are closed in winter and a few cases of missing monthly visitation data owing to random malfunctions of car counters. Robust standard errors are in parentheses. The full model results are in Appendix Table A5.