Premium
Out of sight, out of mind: public and research interest in insects is negatively correlated with their conservation status
Author(s) -
Wang Zhengyang,
Zeng Jimmy,
Meng Weilin,
Lohman David J.,
Pierce Naomi E.
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
insect conservation and diversity
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.061
H-Index - 39
eISSN - 1752-4598
pISSN - 1752-458X
DOI - 10.1111/icad.12499
Subject(s) - endangered species , salience (neuroscience) , biology , iucn red list , ecology , conservation status , the internet , public interest , geography , habitat , political science , world wide web , neuroscience , computer science , law
Conservation ‘culturomics’ analyses changes in word frequencies within large digital sources to gain conservation insights. Studies of mammals and birds have found little correlation between conservation need and research effort or popular interest. In this study, we examine research and public interest in 9355 potentially endangered insect species from the Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List. Using search counts from Google search, Google Scholar and Ngram as indicators of public and research interest (Internet salience), we found that Internet attention is negatively correlated with the level of threat faced by an insect species. All measures of Internet salience and research effort were highly correlated, and searches for an insect's scientific name were more likely if it had a common name. Since few past studies have incorporated phylogenetic information into their analyses, we used search counts and Twitter text content to study the phylogenetic signal of research interest across 870 insect families. Phylogenetic regressions demonstrate that species‐rich families receive more searches, but research interest is not proportional to the size of a family. Phylogenetically distinct insect families receive fewer searches per family and per species. Our results suggest that many endangered insects, unlike vertebrates, have been largely ignored on the World Wide Web.