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Searching the flames: Trends in global and regional public interest in wildfires

Cristina Santin Nuno, Aristides Moustakas Orcid Logo, Stefan Doerr Orcid Logo

Environmental Science & Policy, Volume: 146, Pages: 151 - 161

Swansea University Authors: Cristina Santin Nuno, Stefan Doerr Orcid Logo

  • Accepted Manuscript under embargo until: 24th May 2025

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DOI (Published version): 10.1016/j.envsci.2023.05.008

Abstract

Interactions between humans and wildfires have increased in many regions over the last decades driven by climate and land-use changes. A shift towards more adaptive fire management and policies is urgently needed but remains difficult to achieve. Better understanding of public interest in wildfire c...

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Published in: Environmental Science & Policy
ISSN: 1462-9011 1873-6416
Published: Elsevier BV 2023
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URI: https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa63531
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A shift towards more adaptive fire management and policies is urgently needed but remains difficult to achieve. Better understanding of public interest in wildfire can facilitate this transition, as the public is a key driver for policy decisions. We used Google Trends to assess temporal patterns (2004–2020) in public interest on wildfires worldwide and in five case study countries (Australia, Canada, Indonesia, Portugal, USA). Public interest consistently shows a cyclic pattern with low background and short-lasting spikes during fire seasons and catastrophic events. Wildfires that receive the most interest worldwide are located in Western countries, especially the USA. There is usually high demand for news on wildfires when spikes in interest happen. Overall global interest in wildfire has risen twice: first for a short period in 2007–2008, concomitant to catastrophic wildfires in California, and again since 2017, probably triggered by a series of catastrophic fire events around the globe. Nevertheless, public interest in wildfire is low when compared with socioeconomically more costly earthquakes or hurricanes. The short and seasonal interest in wildfire may present an important obstacle to the implementation of wildfire mitigation policies that require year-round approaches. However, the fact that the public uses the internet to obtain basic knowledge about wildfire functioning and impacts, especially during the interest spikes, can facilitate targeting awareness campaigns. 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spelling v2 63531 2023-05-24 Searching the flames: Trends in global and regional public interest in wildfires 993c82cbaf875c1268156360e83c4dfd Cristina Santin Nuno Cristina Santin Nuno true false 575eb5094f2328249328b3e43deb5088 0000-0002-8700-9002 Stefan Doerr Stefan Doerr true false 2023-05-24 FGSEN Interactions between humans and wildfires have increased in many regions over the last decades driven by climate and land-use changes. A shift towards more adaptive fire management and policies is urgently needed but remains difficult to achieve. Better understanding of public interest in wildfire can facilitate this transition, as the public is a key driver for policy decisions. We used Google Trends to assess temporal patterns (2004–2020) in public interest on wildfires worldwide and in five case study countries (Australia, Canada, Indonesia, Portugal, USA). Public interest consistently shows a cyclic pattern with low background and short-lasting spikes during fire seasons and catastrophic events. Wildfires that receive the most interest worldwide are located in Western countries, especially the USA. There is usually high demand for news on wildfires when spikes in interest happen. Overall global interest in wildfire has risen twice: first for a short period in 2007–2008, concomitant to catastrophic wildfires in California, and again since 2017, probably triggered by a series of catastrophic fire events around the globe. Nevertheless, public interest in wildfire is low when compared with socioeconomically more costly earthquakes or hurricanes. The short and seasonal interest in wildfire may present an important obstacle to the implementation of wildfire mitigation policies that require year-round approaches. However, the fact that the public uses the internet to obtain basic knowledge about wildfire functioning and impacts, especially during the interest spikes, can facilitate targeting awareness campaigns. These could be not only about wildfires but also about broader related environmental issues. Journal Article Environmental Science &amp; Policy 146 151 161 Elsevier BV 1462-9011 1873-6416 Google trends, Relative search interest, Forest fires, Bushfires, Natural hazards, Wildfire impacts, Social perceptions 1 8 2023 2023-08-01 10.1016/j.envsci.2023.05.008 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.envsci.2023.05.008 COLLEGE NANME Science and Engineering - Faculty COLLEGE CODE FGSEN Swansea University This work was supported by the European Cooperation in Science and Technology (FIRElinks COST Action grant no. CA18135). C. S. received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Grant Agreement 663830 and the Spanish ‘Ramon y Cajal’ programme, Ref. N. RYC2018–025797-I. S.D. was supported by the H2020 grant FirEUrisk, Ref. 101003890. 2023-07-18T14:14:58.0587335 2023-05-24T13:20:40.2310740 Faculty of Science and Engineering School of Biosciences, Geography and Physics - Geography Cristina Santin Nuno 1 Aristides Moustakas 0000-0002-6334-747x 2 Stefan Doerr 0000-0002-8700-9002 3 Under embargo Under embargo 2023-05-25T09:56:01.6387511 Output 1505309 application/pdf Accepted Manuscript true 2025-05-24T00:00:00.0000000 Distributed under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0). true eng https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
title Searching the flames: Trends in global and regional public interest in wildfires
spellingShingle Searching the flames: Trends in global and regional public interest in wildfires
Cristina Santin Nuno
Stefan Doerr
title_short Searching the flames: Trends in global and regional public interest in wildfires
title_full Searching the flames: Trends in global and regional public interest in wildfires
title_fullStr Searching the flames: Trends in global and regional public interest in wildfires
title_full_unstemmed Searching the flames: Trends in global and regional public interest in wildfires
title_sort Searching the flames: Trends in global and regional public interest in wildfires
author_id_str_mv 993c82cbaf875c1268156360e83c4dfd
575eb5094f2328249328b3e43deb5088
author_id_fullname_str_mv 993c82cbaf875c1268156360e83c4dfd_***_Cristina Santin Nuno
575eb5094f2328249328b3e43deb5088_***_Stefan Doerr
author Cristina Santin Nuno
Stefan Doerr
author2 Cristina Santin Nuno
Aristides Moustakas
Stefan Doerr
format Journal article
container_title Environmental Science &amp; Policy
container_volume 146
container_start_page 151
publishDate 2023
institution Swansea University
issn 1462-9011
1873-6416
doi_str_mv 10.1016/j.envsci.2023.05.008
publisher Elsevier BV
college_str Faculty of Science and Engineering
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hierarchy_top_id facultyofscienceandengineering
hierarchy_top_title Faculty of Science and Engineering
hierarchy_parent_id facultyofscienceandengineering
hierarchy_parent_title Faculty of Science and Engineering
department_str School of Biosciences, Geography and Physics - Geography{{{_:::_}}}Faculty of Science and Engineering{{{_:::_}}}School of Biosciences, Geography and Physics - Geography
url http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.envsci.2023.05.008
document_store_str 0
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description Interactions between humans and wildfires have increased in many regions over the last decades driven by climate and land-use changes. A shift towards more adaptive fire management and policies is urgently needed but remains difficult to achieve. Better understanding of public interest in wildfire can facilitate this transition, as the public is a key driver for policy decisions. We used Google Trends to assess temporal patterns (2004–2020) in public interest on wildfires worldwide and in five case study countries (Australia, Canada, Indonesia, Portugal, USA). Public interest consistently shows a cyclic pattern with low background and short-lasting spikes during fire seasons and catastrophic events. Wildfires that receive the most interest worldwide are located in Western countries, especially the USA. There is usually high demand for news on wildfires when spikes in interest happen. Overall global interest in wildfire has risen twice: first for a short period in 2007–2008, concomitant to catastrophic wildfires in California, and again since 2017, probably triggered by a series of catastrophic fire events around the globe. Nevertheless, public interest in wildfire is low when compared with socioeconomically more costly earthquakes or hurricanes. The short and seasonal interest in wildfire may present an important obstacle to the implementation of wildfire mitigation policies that require year-round approaches. However, the fact that the public uses the internet to obtain basic knowledge about wildfire functioning and impacts, especially during the interest spikes, can facilitate targeting awareness campaigns. These could be not only about wildfires but also about broader related environmental issues.
published_date 2023-08-01T14:14:53Z
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score 11.036378

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