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  <front>
    <journal-meta>
      <journal-id journal-id-type="publisher-id">10</journal-id>
      <journal-id journal-id-type="index">urn:lsid:arphahub.com:pub:6BEA2F36-F41A-5C4C-8F71-33F322F204B5</journal-id>
      <journal-id journal-id-type="aggregator">urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:0D3F4FBA-8FC4-4738-B942-05DB471A61E6</journal-id>
      <journal-title-group>
        <journal-title xml:lang="en">Nature Conservation</journal-title>
        <abbrev-journal-title xml:lang="en">NC</abbrev-journal-title>
      </journal-title-group>
      <issn pub-type="ppub">1314-6947</issn>
      <issn pub-type="epub">1314-3301</issn>
      <publisher>
        <publisher-name>Pensoft Publishers</publisher-name>
      </publisher>
    </journal-meta>
    <article-meta>
      <article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.3897/natureconservation.64.193686</article-id>
      <article-id pub-id-type="publisher-id">193686</article-id>
      <article-categories>
        <subj-group subj-group-type="heading">
          <subject>Review Article</subject>
        </subj-group>
        <subj-group subj-group-type="biological_taxon">
          <subject>Plantae</subject>
        </subj-group>
        <subj-group subj-group-type="scientific_subject">
          <subject>Ecology &amp; Environmental sciences</subject>
          <subject>Economics and Nature Conservation</subject>
          <subject>Ecotourism</subject>
        </subj-group>
        <subj-group subj-group-type="geological_era">
          <subject>Cenozoic</subject>
        </subj-group>
        <subj-group subj-group-type="geographical_area">
          <subject>World</subject>
        </subj-group>
      </article-categories>
      <title-group>
        <article-title>Negative effects of ecotourism in protected areas: a bibliometric analysis from a recreation ecology perspective</article-title>
      </title-group>
      <contrib-group content-type="authors">
        <contrib contrib-type="author" corresp="yes">
          <name name-style="western">
            <surname>Huepa Briñez</surname>
            <given-names>José Armando</given-names>
          </name>
          <email xlink:type="simple">jahuepa68002@umanizales.edu.co</email>
          <uri content-type="orcid">https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6282-1566</uri>
          <xref ref-type="aff" rid="A1">1</xref>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/conceptualization/">Conceptualization</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/writing-original-draft/">Writing - original draft</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/writing-review-editing/">Writing - review and editing</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/data-curation/">Data curation</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/formal-analysis/">Formal analysis</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/investigation/">Investigation</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/methodology/">Methodology</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/project-administration/">Project administration</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/resources/">Resources</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/visualization/">Visualization</role>
        </contrib>
        <contrib contrib-type="author" corresp="no">
          <name name-style="western">
            <surname>Florez Yepes</surname>
            <given-names>Gloria Yaneth</given-names>
          </name>
          <uri content-type="orcid">https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4185-0178</uri>
          <xref ref-type="aff" rid="A1">1</xref>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/conceptualization/">Conceptualization</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/writing-original-draft/">Writing - original draft</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/writing-review-editing/">Writing - review and editing</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/methodology/">Methodology</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/resources/">Resources</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/software/">Software</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/supervision/">Supervision</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/validation/">Validation</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/visualization/">Visualization</role>
        </contrib>
        <contrib contrib-type="author" corresp="no">
          <name name-style="western">
            <surname>Ospino</surname>
            <given-names>Javier Orozco</given-names>
          </name>
          <uri content-type="orcid">https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4234-7630</uri>
          <xref ref-type="aff" rid="A2">2</xref>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/conceptualization/">Conceptualization</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/writing-review-editing/">Writing - review and editing</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/formal-analysis/">Formal analysis</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/investigation/">Investigation</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/methodology/">Methodology</role>
          <role content-type="http://credit.niso.org/contributor-roles/visualization/">Visualization</role>
        </contrib>
      </contrib-group>
      <aff id="A1">
        <label>1</label>
        <addr-line content-type="verbatim">Faculty of Accounting, Economic, and Administrative Sciences, University of Manizales, Cra. 9ª, No. 19-03, Manizales, Colombia</addr-line>
        <institution>Environmental and Sanitary Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Technology, Popular University of Cesar</institution>
        <addr-line content-type="city">Valledupar</addr-line>
        <country>Colombia</country>
        <uri content-type="ror">https://ror.org/05pzmdf74</uri>
      </aff>
      <aff id="A2">
        <label>2</label>
        <addr-line content-type="verbatim">Environmental and Sanitary Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Technology, Popular University of Cesar, Street 21 #29-56, Valledupar, Colombia</addr-line>
        <institution>Faculty of Accounting, Economic, and Administrative Sciences, University of Manizales</institution>
        <addr-line content-type="city">Manizales</addr-line>
        <country>Colombia</country>
      </aff>
      <author-notes>
        <fn fn-type="corresp">
          <p>Corresponding author: José Armando Huepa Briñez (<email xlink:type="simple">jahuepa68002@umanizales.edu.co</email>)</p>
        </fn>
        <fn fn-type="edited-by">
          <p>Academic editor: Atila Gül</p>
        </fn>
      </author-notes>
      <pub-date pub-type="collection">
        <year>2026</year>
      </pub-date>
      <pub-date pub-type="epub">
        <day>01</day>
        <month>09</month>
        <year>2026</year>
      </pub-date>
      <volume>64</volume>
      <fpage>213</fpage>
      <lpage>228</lpage>
      <uri content-type="arpha" xlink:href="http://openbiodiv.net/E40735E1-418D-524C-9569-027B83569F51">E40735E1-418D-524C-9569-027B83569F51</uri>
      <uri content-type="zoobank" xlink:href="https://zoobank.org/D0F8FC34-EEFE-4765-8193-EDCC43A14706">D0F8FC34-EEFE-4765-8193-EDCC43A14706</uri>
      <history>
        <date date-type="received">
          <day>30</day>
          <month>03</month>
          <year>2026</year>
        </date>
        <date date-type="accepted">
          <day>09</day>
          <month>08</month>
          <year>2026</year>
        </date>
      </history>
      <permissions>
        <copyright-statement>José Armando Huepa Briñez, Gloria Yaneth Florez Yepes, Javier Orozco Ospino</copyright-statement>
        <license license-type="creative-commons-attribution" xlink:href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/" xlink:type="simple">
          <license-p>This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.</license-p>
        </license>
      </permissions>
      <self-uri content-type="zoobank" xlink:type="simple">https://zoobank.org/D0F8FC34-EEFE-4765-8193-EDCC43A14706</self-uri>
      <abstract>
        <label>Abstract</label>
        <p>Ecotourism in protected areas has experienced significant growth in recent years, increasing scientific interest in understanding its environmental impacts. This study presents a bibliometric analysis of the scientific literature on the negative effects of ecotourism in protected areas from a recreation ecology perspective. Using the Scopus database, 684 documents published between 2016 and 2025 were analyzed to identify publication trends, leading countries, influential authors and institutions, subject areas, and thematic evolution. The results reveal a sustained increase in scientific production, with an annual growth rate of 15.25%, particularly from 2019 onward. Environmental Science, Social Sciences, and Agricultural and Biological Sciences were the predominant research areas. The United States, Australia, China, the United Kingdom, and Canada accounted for the largest scientific output, while keyword co-occurrence analysis identified ecotourism, protected areas, biodiversity, sustainability, recreation, and environmental conservation as the dominant research themes. The reviewed literature consistently reports environmental impacts associated with ecotourism, including wildlife disturbance, soil degradation and erosion, CO<sub>2</sub> emissions, waste generation, and increasing pressure on natural resources. Overall, the findings demonstrate the growing maturity of this research field and highlight the need to strengthen management strategies that promote environmentally sustainable ecotourism in protected areas.</p>
      </abstract>
      <kwd-group>
        <label>Key words:</label>
        <kwd>Conservation</kwd>
        <kwd>ecology</kwd>
        <kwd>environmental impact</kwd>
        <kwd>protected areas</kwd>
        <kwd>sustainability</kwd>
      </kwd-group>
      <funding-group>
        <funding-statement>The University of Manizales is the collaborating institution for this article.</funding-statement>
      </funding-group>
    </article-meta>
  </front>
  <body>
    <sec sec-type="Introduction" id="sec1">
      <title>Introduction</title>
      <p>Protected areas are among the world’s most important instruments for conserving biodiversity, maintaining ecosystem services, and preserving natural and cultural heritage. At the same time, these areas have become increasingly important destinations for nature-based tourism, particularly ecotourism, which is widely promoted as a strategy to support biodiversity conservation while generating economic benefits and livelihood opportunities for local communities (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B23">National Natural Parks of Colombia 2017</xref>). The continued growth of nature-based tourism has been driven by increasing demand for authentic and sustainable travel experiences, as visitors increasingly seek destinations that provide direct contact with nature while promoting well-being, adventure, and environmental education (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B6">Buckley 2022</xref>). However, achieving a balance between conservation objectives and visitor use remains a major challenge, as increasing recreational demand may compromise the ecological integrity of protected areas if tourism is not adequately planned and managed.</p>
      <p>Although ecotourism is generally associated with sustainable development, numerous studies have shown that recreational activities can have adverse environmental impacts, including changes in wildlife behavior, vegetation degradation, soil compaction, trail erosion, and ecosystem disturbances -effects that have been widely documented in both classic studies and recent research (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B19">Marion and Leung 1998</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B13">Henning 2017</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B16">Leung et al. 2018</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B27">Pickering et al. 2023</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B34">Smith and Pickering 2025</xref>). These impacts are particularly evident along trails and at campsites, picnic areas, and wildlife observation sites, which receive the highest levels of visitor use (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B3">Backman and Potts 1993</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B45">Wight 1996</xref>). Consequently, understanding visitor-induced ecological change has become essential for designing effective conservation strategies and improving visitor management in protected areas (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B7">Bushell 2003</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B5">Buckley and King 2003</xref>).</p>
      <p>Recreation ecology provides a scientific framework for understanding and evaluating the environmental effects of visitor use by examining how recreational activities influence ecosystem structure and function while identifying management practices that minimize ecological degradation without compromising visitor opportunities. As nature-based tourism continues to expand worldwide, recreation ecology has become increasingly important for supporting evidence-based management decisions in protected areas. The discipline is founded on the premise that recreational activities represent a source of ecological disturbance capable of affecting both biotic and abiotic ecosystem components (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B21">Miller et al. 2022</xref>). Recent studies have further demonstrated that visitor use may promote the introduction of invasive species, alter wildlife behavior and habitat use, reduce population densities, and modify ecosystem processes, highlighting the need for effective monitoring and adaptive management strategies in protected areas (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B33">Sardar and Islam 2025</xref>).</p>
      <p>Several bibliometric studies have examined the development of ecotourism and protected area research, identifying publication trends, collaboration networks, leading countries, institutions, and major research themes such as conservation, visitor management, community participation, and sustainable tourism (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B43">Uswathul et al. 2022</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B8">Cabrera et al. 2025</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B46">Zaldívar et al. 2026</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B1">Agustin et al. 2026</xref>). Likewise, recent reviews have analyzed the evolution of recreation management and tourism research in protected areas. Nevertheless, these studies have largely addressed ecotourism or outdoor recreation from broad perspectives, without specifically focusing on the environmental impacts generated by recreational activities or examining them through the conceptual framework of recreation ecology.</p>
      <p>Consequently, despite the growing scientific interest in ecotourism and protected areas, the intellectual structure, thematic evolution, collaboration patterns, and emerging research directions concerning visitor-induced ecological impacts remain insufficiently understood. A comprehensive bibliometric assessment focused specifically on the environmental impacts of ecotourism from a recreation ecology perspective is still lacking.</p>
      <p>To address this gap, the present study provides a bibliometric analysis of the scientific literature on the environmental impacts of ecotourism in protected areas published between 2016 and 2025. Specifically, this study identifies publication trends, leading authors, institutions, countries, and collaboration networks, examines the thematic evolution of the field, and identifies emerging research topics and knowledge gaps. By integrating bibliometric techniques with the conceptual framework of recreation ecology, this study contributes to a better understanding of the evolution of research on ecotourism impacts and provides evidence that can support future interdisciplinary research, adaptive management, conservation planning, and sustainable visitor use in protected areas.</p>
    </sec>
    <sec sec-type="materials|methods" id="sec2">
      <title>Materials and methods</title>
      <p>Initially, a preliminary keyword search was conducted to define the search strategy and construct the search queries used to retrieve the information. The methodological procedure followed in the study is presented in Fig. <xref ref-type="fig" rid="F1">1</xref>.</p>
      <fig id="F1">
        <object-id content-type="arpha">DDB94DFD-4409-5D8A-ABAA-83694EB1129F</object-id>
        <label>Figure 1.</label>
        <caption>
          <p>Methodological framework used for data collection and bibliometric analysis (authors’ elaboration).</p>
        </caption>
        <graphic xlink:href="nature_conservation-64-213_article-193686__-g001.jpg" id="oo_1762333.jpg">
          <uri content-type="original_file">https://binary.pensoft.net/fig/1762333</uri>
        </graphic>
      </fig>
      <p>Subsequently, the following research questions were formulated: (a) In which countries and subject areas is research being conducted on the negative impacts of nature-based ecotourism in protected areas? (b) What are the main research trends regarding the negative impacts of nature-based ecotourism in protected areas? (c) How are collaborative networks structured among countries, authors, and journals in this field of research? (d) Which scientific sources are the most influential based on the number of citations they have received?</p>
      <p>Based on these questions, a quantitative bibliometric analysis was conducted. The bibliographic dataset was obtained exclusively from the Scopus database because of its broad multidisciplinary coverage and the high number of indexed publications. The preliminary search identified the most representative keywords for the topic and led to the development of five search equations (Table <xref ref-type="table" rid="T1">1</xref>).</p>
      <table-wrap id="T1" position="float" orientation="portrait">
        <label>Table 1.</label>
        <caption>
          <p>Search operators (original research in the Scopus database in 2025).</p>
        </caption>
        <table>
          <tbody>
            <tr>
              <th rowspan="1" colspan="1">
                <bold>Operator</bold>
              </th>
              <th rowspan="1" colspan="1">
                <bold>Search operator</bold>
              </th>
              <th rowspan="1" colspan="1">
                <bold>Results</bold>
              </th>
            </tr>
            <tr>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">
                <bold>Operator 1</bold>
              </td>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">(implications AND negative AND ecotourism AND protected AND areas AND recreation AND ecology)</td>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">839</td>
            </tr>
            <tr>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">
                <bold>Operator 2</bold>
              </td>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">(implications AND negative AND tourism AND protected AND areas AND recreation AND ecology)</td>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">1,430</td>
            </tr>
            <tr>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">
                <bold>Operator 3</bold>
              </td>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">(impact AND tourism AND protected AND areas AND recreation AND ecology)</td>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">9,369</td>
            </tr>
            <tr>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">
                <bold>Operator 4</bold>
              </td>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">(implications AND ecotourism AND protected AND areas AND recreation AND ecology)</td>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">3,720</td>
            </tr>
            <tr>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">
                <bold>Operator 5</bold>
              </td>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">(impact AND negative AND tourism AND protected AND areas AND recreation AND ecology)</td>
              <td rowspan="1" colspan="1">1,881</td>
            </tr>
          </tbody>
        </table>
      </table-wrap>
      <p>The final search was conducted on 20 January 2026 using the following Boolean expression: (implications AND negative AND ecotourism AND protected AND areas AND recreation AND ecology).</p>
      <p>The initial search returned 839 documents, including research articles, review articles, and conference papers. Subsequently, the dataset was refined by restricting the publication period to the last 10 full years, 2016–2025. Publications from 2026 were excluded because, at the time of the search, the indexing process and scientific output for that year were not yet complete. As a result of this temporal filter, the final dataset consisted of 684 documents. No additional manual screening or document selection was performed because the bibliometric analysis was conducted on the complete set of records retrieved after applying the predefined search criteria and database filters.</p>
      <p>The search was limited to publications in English. Since all records were retrieved from a single database (Scopus), it was not necessary to remove duplicate records. The final dataset was exported in RIS and BibTeX (.bib) formats for bibliometric processing. The VOSviewer software was used to construct co-authorship, co-occurrence, and citation networks, while complementary analyses, including annual scientific output, citation patterns, collaboration networks, author productivity, and the three-field diagram (countries–authors–journals), were performed using the Bibliometrix package implemented in R software. Finally, the citation analysis considered a minimum threshold of 10 citations per document and five documents per journal.</p>
      <sec sec-type="Selection of search operators" id="sec3">
        <title>Selection of search operators</title>
        <p>Based on the conceptual relevance criteria detailed in Table <xref ref-type="table" rid="T1">1</xref>, Operator 1 was selected due to its strict alignment with the object of study. Although Operators 2, 3, 4, and 5 yielded a significantly larger volume of documents, manual review of the samples revealed that they included tangential discussions unrelated to recreation ecology.</p>
        <p>Based on the initial 839 results obtained from Scopus and after applying the 10-year profiling filter (2016–2025), the final collection was consolidated into 684 scientific publications focused on the negative effects of ecotourism from the perspective of recreation ecology in protected areas.</p>
      </sec>
    </sec>
    <sec sec-type="Results" id="sec4">
      <title>Results</title>
      <sec sec-type="Analysis of bibliometric production" id="sec5">
        <title>Analysis of bibliometric production</title>
        <p>The descriptive analysis of the metadata of the 684 consolidated documents yieldsed the following distributions of scientific production:</p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Document typology" id="sec6">
        <title>Document typology</title>
        <p>Scientific articles, accounted for 77.8%, followed by reviews (8.0%), book chapters (6.9%), books (6.1%), conference papers (0.4%), and notes/editorials (0.8%). Regarding indexing by academic disciplines, the documents were mainly distributed across Environmental Science (26.3%), Social Sciences (19.7%), Agricultural and Biological Sciences (15.7%), Business and Management (15.5%), Economics (5.5%), Earth and Planetary Sciences (3.9%), and Energy Sciences (3.8%) (Fig. <xref ref-type="fig" rid="F2">2</xref>).</p>
        <fig id="F2">
          <object-id content-type="arpha">3B340CB3-106A-5CC1-B560-F24501E88856</object-id>
          <label>Figure 2.</label>
          <caption>
            <p>Document by thematic area (own research using data from the Scopus database).</p>
          </caption>
          <graphic xlink:href="nature_conservation-64-213_article-193686__-g002.jpg" id="oo_1762334.jpg">
            <uri content-type="original_file">https://binary.pensoft.net/fig/1762334</uri>
          </graphic>
        </fig>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Geographic distribution" id="sec7">
        <title>Geographic distribution</title>
        <p>A total of 101 countries reported scientific activity in this field, of which 47 met a minimum threshold of 5 publications. The cumulative national output was led by the United States (119), followed by Australia (78), China (78), the United Kingdom (62), and Canada (50) (Fig. <xref ref-type="fig" rid="F3">3</xref>).</p>
        <fig id="F3">
          <object-id content-type="arpha">75EDF060-90FD-5B38-82AC-32F378F90EE4</object-id>
          <label>Figure 3.</label>
          <caption>
            <p>Documents by country (own research using data from the Scopus database).</p>
          </caption>
          <graphic xlink:href="nature_conservation-64-213_article-193686__-g003.jpg" id="oo_1762335.jpg">
            <uri content-type="original_file">https://binary.pensoft.net/fig/1762335</uri>
          </graphic>
        </fig>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Institutional leadership" id="sec8">
        <title>Institutional leadership</title>
        <p>The five institutions with the largest volume of documents published in the sample were Griffith University (16), Murdoch University (14), Chinese Academy of Sciences (13), University of Johannesburg (12), and Universidade do Algarve (12) (Fig. <xref ref-type="fig" rid="F4">4</xref>).</p>
        <fig id="F4">
          <object-id content-type="arpha">709A0FB9-FA5A-5849-B9A4-F6120495994F</object-id>
          <label>Figure 4.</label>
          <caption>
            <p>List of institutions that publish the most scientific documents (own research using data from the Scopus database).</p>
          </caption>
          <graphic xlink:href="nature_conservation-64-213_article-193686__-g004.jpg" id="oo_1762336.jpg">
            <uri content-type="original_file">https://binary.pensoft.net/fig/1762336</uri>
          </graphic>
        </fig>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Networks of co-occurrence and co-authorship" id="sec9">
        <title>Networks of co-occurrence and co-authorship</title>
        <p>Keyword analysis identified 263 terms structured into six main thematic clusters, where ecotourism acts as the central node of the network with a total of 1,099 structural links and 165 direct co-occurrences (Fig. <xref ref-type="fig" rid="F5">5</xref>).</p>
        <fig id="F5">
          <object-id content-type="arpha">A1483D75-BB9B-54F0-93EE-7F29E1776164</object-id>
          <label>Figure 5.</label>
          <caption>
            <p>List of keywords declared by the authors (own research using data from the Scopus database).</p>
          </caption>
          <graphic xlink:href="nature_conservation-64-213_article-193686__-g005.jpg" id="oo_1762337.jpg">
            <uri content-type="original_file">https://binary.pensoft.net/fig/1762337</uri>
          </graphic>
        </fig>
        <p>Furthermore, the topology of the co-authorship network shows that the relational structure of the researchers with the highest academic output is centered on the nodes of Newsome D., Dearden P., and Cong R. (Fig. <xref ref-type="fig" rid="F6">6</xref>).</p>
        <fig id="F6">
          <object-id content-type="arpha">70C1F0FC-1732-5CAF-BF00-95106D22FD74</object-id>
          <label>Figure 6.</label>
          <caption>
            <p>List of scientists with their publications on the selected topic.</p>
          </caption>
          <graphic xlink:href="nature_conservation-64-213_article-193686__-g006.jpg" id="oo_1762338.jpg">
            <uri content-type="original_file">https://binary.pensoft.net/fig/1762338</uri>
          </graphic>
        </fig>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Time evolution and performance indicators (R software)" id="sec10">
        <title>Time evolution and performance indicators (R software)</title>
        <p>The global metrics calculated for the period 2016–2025 recorded 684 documents distributed across 247 journal and book sources, with an average of 20.14 citations per document and a co-authorship index of 4.08. Fifty-seven documents with a single author were identified within a total of 2,432 authors, and a cumulative total of 46,367 cited references was recorded. The annual growth rate of publications was 15.25%, with an average publication age of 3.4 years.</p>
        <p>Annual scientific production showed an upward trend concentrated between 2019 and 2025, registering 49, 70, 64, 68, 106, 108 and 104 articles, respectively (Fig. <xref ref-type="fig" rid="F7">7</xref>).</p>
        <fig id="F7">
          <object-id content-type="arpha">AA15C9B9-6332-5FDC-B7EF-5C581584C2F8</object-id>
          <label>Figure 7.</label>
          <caption>
            <p>Number of publications per year (own research using data from Scopus).</p>
          </caption>
          <graphic xlink:href="nature_conservation-64-213_article-193686__-g007.jpg" id="oo_1762339.jpg">
            <uri content-type="original_file">https://binary.pensoft.net/fig/1762339</uri>
          </graphic>
        </fig>
        <p>In contrast, the average number of annual citations showed an irregular and fluctuating trajectory during the same period (Fig. <xref ref-type="fig" rid="F8">8</xref>).</p>
        <fig id="F8">
          <object-id content-type="arpha">8A8D343A-B077-5386-B035-9C4A2F4E0743</object-id>
          <label>Figure 8.</label>
          <caption>
            <p>Number of citations per year (publications with Scopus data).</p>
          </caption>
          <graphic xlink:href="nature_conservation-64-213_article-193686__-g008.jpg" id="oo_1762340.jpg">
            <uri content-type="original_file">https://binary.pensoft.net/fig/1762340</uri>
          </graphic>
        </fig>
      </sec>
    </sec>
    <sec sec-type="Discussion" id="sec11">
      <title>Discussion</title>
      <sec sec-type="Theoretical, conceptual and management implications" id="sec12">
        <title>Theoretical, conceptual and management implications</title>
        <p>Epistemological evolution and interdisciplinary approach</p>
        <p>Bibliometric findings confirm a marked structural duality in knowledge construction within recreation ecology. Historically, the field has been dominated by Environmental Sciences (26.3%), corroborating a solid biophysical foundation focused on diagnosing tangible damage to soil, flora, and fauna. However, the consolidated emergence of Social Sciences (19.7%) and economic and management disciplines which together account for over 40% of output, reveals a marked paradigmatic shift toward integrated socio-environmental frameworks.</p>
        <p>This conceptual transition, however, coexists with a significant methodological gap. As <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B37">Sumanapala and Wolf (2019)</xref> point out, the relationship between social and ecological dimensions has traditionally been neglected in recreation ecology, with few interdisciplinary studies effectively connecting both aspects.</p>
        <p>This disconnect poses a critical predictive and management challenge: biophysical impacts do not occur in a vacuum. When ecotourism planning lacks an interdisciplinary preventive design, alterations to ecosystems are directly transferred to the social fabric of local communities. Multiple studies warn that the absence of optimal conditions in the planning and management of critical vectors, such as water pollution or waste management, ultimately transforms ecological problems into latent social crises, tensions in territorial governance, and public health issues (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B36">Staniscia et al. 2019</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B12">Gao et al. 2022</xref>).</p>
        <p>Therefore, bibliometric data reflect the urgency of abandoning purely ecological or purely commercial approaches and adopting integrated models at greater spatial and temporal scales that systematically articulate recreation, ecology and management sciences (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B22">Monz et al. 2013</xref>).</p>
        <sec sec-type="Epistemic asymmetry and the risks of the Global North geographic bias" id="sec13">
          <title>Epistemic asymmetry and the risks of the Global North geographic bias</title>
          <p>The research infrastructure analyzed reveals a profound geo-economic centralization. The volume of scientific publications is firmly dominated by a bloc of developed Anglophone nations-the United States with 119 documents, Australia with 78, the United Kingdom with 62, and Canada with 50-with China being the only significant counterpart on the Asian axis. This empirical evidence supports <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B33">Sardar and Islam’s (2025)</xref> thesis on global epistemic asymmetries in recreation ecology, where developing economies are relegated to a peripheral role as objects of study rather than generators of conceptual frameworks.</p>
          <p>From a theoretical point of view, this geographical distribution implies a severe territorial limitation: the dominant carrying capacity models, impact indicators, and tourism mitigation regulations have been designed and validated under robust institutional realities, stable budgets, and ecosystem dynamics typical of temperate zones of the Global North (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B20">Marion 2016</xref>).</p>
          <p>The direct and isomorphic transfer of these management approaches to the contexts of the Global South is highly problematic. In developing regions, the conservation of protected areas and national parks must coexist with complex scenarios of socioeconomic vulnerability, high levels of local poverty, weak state oversight, and tropical or megadiverse ecosystems of extreme intrinsic fragility.</p>
          <p>For example, while in the Global North the discussion may focus on optimizing physical capacities on mountain trails (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B9">Cetin and Sevik 2016</xref>), in the Global South, as demonstrated by studies in Colombian national parks, pressures intersect with critical deficiencies in governance models, a lack of social consensus, low adoption of good environmental practices by local operators, and the exclusion or displacement of native communities (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B24">Oliveros and Vargas 2018</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B41">UNESCO 2019</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B11">Duran and Olivero 2021</xref>). This disparity highlights the urgent need to geographically diversify scientific agendas and develop methodologies contextualized to the institutional and territorial realities of emerging economies.</p>
        </sec>
        <sec sec-type="Field impact dynamics: biodiversity, infrastructure and transportation" id="sec14">
          <title>Field impact dynamics: biodiversity, infrastructure and transportation</title>
          <p>The results of the bibliometric analysis, particularly the centrality of key descriptors and the dense network of 46,367 cited references, align with warnings from major global organizations and field research on the detrimental impacts of poorly managed tourism in protected areas (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B39">UNEP-GEO-6 2018</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B40">UNEP-WCMC 2020</xref>). Accumulated scientific evidence demonstrates that visitor pressure without adequate planning exacerbates environmental degradation and biodiversity loss <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B42">UNWTO 2019</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B15">IUCN 2021</xref>).</p>
          <p>When examining the empirical patterns identified in the literature, the negative impacts are strongly manifested in three critical dimensions:</p>
        </sec>
        <sec sec-type="Infrastructure saturation and waste management" id="sec15">
          <title>Infrastructure saturation and waste management</title>
          <p>The uncontrolled increase in tourism frequently exceeds the capacity of local infrastructure. This results in severe deficiencies in solid waste management and the saturation of wastewater treatment systems, causing a rapid deterioration in water quality in sensitive ecosystems (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B38">Thullah and Jallooh 2021</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B28">Rodriguez-Alcantara et al. 2024</xref>).</p>
        </sec>
        <sec sec-type="Acoustic and landscape disturbances" id="sec16">
          <title>Acoustic and landscape disturbances</title>
          <p>Specialized studies in highly sensitive national parks, such as those in Alaska and Hawaii reveal that tourist transportation patterns, including both ground routes and low-altitude overflights, drastically alter natural soundscapes. These intrusions generate critical acoustic disturbances that disrupt ecological integrity and destabilize wildlife behavior (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B26">Peterson et al. 2022</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B4">Betchkal et al. 2023</xref>).</p>
        </sec>
        <sec sec-type="Carbon footprint tensions" id="sec17">
          <title>Carbon footprint tensions</title>
          <p>There is an inherent contradiction between visitor experience and climate sustainability. Research focused on the design of tourist itineraries demonstrates that efforts to maximize economic benefit or customer satisfaction frequently conflict with the goal of minimizing CO<sub>2</sub> emissions associated with transportation (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B29">Ruiz and Montoya 2021</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B14">IPCC 2022</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B31">Ruiz et al. 2022</xref>). Although advanced planning tools, such as optimization models and fuzzy logic, have been implemented to mitigate the transportation footprint, these approaches decrease efficiency but do not eliminate the underlying ecological pressures associated with the activity (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B30">Ruiz et al. 2021</xref>).</p>
          <p>These patterns confirm that ecotourism, if it exceeds the actual ecological limits of protected sites, intensifies adverse impacts on the physical, biological, and environmental dimensions, which necessitates the integration of rigorous economic valuation tools and carrying capacity indicators into decision-making (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B17">Londoño and Vargas 2015</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B35">Sobhani et al. 2022</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B18">Lone et al. 2023</xref>).</p>
        </sec>
        <sec sec-type="Centralization of knowledge in publishing networks and methodological limitations" id="sec18">
          <title>Centralization of knowledge in publishing networks and methodological limitations</title>
          <p>The relational triangulation between the highest-producing authors (e.g., Newsome D., Dearden P.), the dominant affiliations (e.g., Murdoch University, Griffith University), and the main dissemination vehicles indexed in Scopus (e.g., journals such as Sustainability or Journal of Sustainable Tourism) demonstrates that the validation of knowledge about the negative effects of ecotourism is mediated by highly concentrated editorial and institutional nodes (Fig. <xref ref-type="fig" rid="F9">9</xref>).</p>
          <fig id="F9">
            <object-id content-type="arpha">F5E3958D-26C3-5D1C-9524-F18B898A64E3</object-id>
            <label>Figure 9.</label>
            <caption>
              <p>Three-field analysis (research using Scopus data).</p>
            </caption>
            <graphic xlink:href="nature_conservation-64-213_article-193686__-g009.jpg" id="oo_1762341.jpg">
              <uri content-type="original_file">https://binary.pensoft.net/fig/1762341</uri>
            </graphic>
          </fig>
          <p>Although this high institutional concentration has spurred specialization within the discipline, explaining its remarkable annual growth rate of 15.25%, it also carries a risk of theoretical and methodological homogenization. Concentrated circuits of co-authorship and editorial review can act as barriers to entry for alternative epistemological approaches or critical studies generated by peripheral institutions. Diversifying both institutional actors and dissemination platforms is essential for a more nuanced understanding of the environmental degradation caused by tourism in protected areas.</p>
          <p>This concentration is also reflected in a methodological limitation of the field: the predominance of the scientific article format in academic journals indexed in Scopus (77.8%) suggests that other publishing forms and local scientific dissemination platforms are underdeveloped or excluded (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B25">Parra-López and Martínez-González 2018</xref>). As <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B10">De la del Río-Rama et al. (2020)</xref> point out, this restricts the exploration of the phenomenon through alternative methodological approaches.</p>
          <p>Finally, it is necessary to acknowledge that bibliometric search methods, while powerful for identifying macro-trends, face the challenge of documentary noise. As evidenced in the selection phase (Table <xref ref-type="table" rid="T1">1</xref>), more than 60% of the results from broader search equations include scattered or tangential literature that does not directly address the actual ecological effects or the perceptions of the actors involved. This validates the need to apply rigorous screening processes and restrictive equations such as Operator 1 to ensure the quality and conceptual relevance of bibliometric reviews (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B44">Wang et al. 2014</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B2">Ahn and Kang 2018</xref>; <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B32">Samal and Dash 2023</xref>).</p>
        </sec>
      </sec>
    </sec>
    <sec sec-type="Conclusion" id="sec19">
      <title>Conclusion</title>
      <p>This study provides a metascientific map of the state of the art of recreation ecology and the negative effects of ecotourism in protected areas during the period 2016–2025. To maintain strict methodological rigor, the conclusions of this research are formally differentiated between the metric findings generated by the bibliometric analysis and the conceptual trends reported by the analyzed scientific literature.</p>
      <sec sec-type="Publication dynamics and temporal evolution" id="sec20">
        <title>Publication dynamics and temporal evolution</title>
        <p>Analysis using R software demonstrates that the field is experiencing a phase of active and accelerated expansion, characterized by an annual growth rate of 15.25% and a low average document age of 3.4 years. The volume of annual scientific output follows an lupward trajectory concentrated between 2019 and 2025, maintaining its momentum even during the COVID-19 crisis. However, the marked irregularity and fluctuation in the average citation rate of 20.14 citations per document reveal that the field is assimilating new schools of thought that have not yet consolidated a homogeneous impact.</p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Knowledge structure and thematic clusters" id="sec21">
        <title>Knowledge structure and thematic clusters</title>
        <p>The relational mapping of keywords identified a network of 263 terms articulated around six distinct thematic clusters. The descriptor “ecotourism” emerged as the central heuristic node with 1,099 structural links and 165 direct co-occurrences, acting as the hinge category that unifies Environmental Science (26.3%), Social Sciences (19.7%), and Business and Management (15.5%). The combined contribution of these three disciplines (over 60%) indicates a shift in thematic focus: the field has transcended isolated biophysical diagnosis to move toward integrated socio-environmental analytical frameworks.</p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Collaboration patterns and invisible colleges" id="sec22">
        <title>Collaboration patterns and invisible colleges</title>
        <p>Topological analysis reveals a densely connected and collective research structure, with a co-authorship index of 4.08 authors per document and only 57 single-author publications within a universe of 2,432 researchers. This co-authorship network is not dispersed but rather strongly centralized in high-performing nodes led by specific scientists (Newsome D., Dearden P., and Cong R.) linked to a group of institutions in the Global North (such as Griffith University and Murdoch University). This configuration confirms the existence of concentrated epistemic communities that influence the direction of the global scientific agenda.</p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Editorial dissemination infrastructure" id="sec23">
        <title>Editorial dissemination infrastructure</title>
        <p>There is marked homogeneity in the vehicles for knowledge transfer, with the indexed scientific journal article format retaining clear predominance (77.8%), concentrated in high-impact platforms such as Sustainability or the Journal of Sustainable Tourism. This centralization in specific editorial and institutional networks promotes rapid disciplinary specialization but imposes barriers to entry for dissenting approaches, alternative methodologies, or peripheral research generated outside this concentrated circuit.</p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Vectors of biophysical degradation" id="sec24">
        <title>Vectors of biophysical degradation</title>
        <p>The reviewed case studies consistently demonstrate that poorly planned tourism activity leads to soil degradation on trails, accelerates biodiversity loss, and creates critical deficiencies in wastewater and solid waste management within national parks. Furthermore, tourist transportation causes severe noise and landscape disturbances that alter wildlife behavior patterns.</p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Sustainability and carbon footprint tensions" id="sec25">
        <title>Sustainability and carbon footprint tensions</title>
        <p>The literature reveals an inherent contradiction between the carbon footprint of visitor transportation and environmental conservation goals, as highlighted by organizations such as UNEP, IUCN, and IPCC. Itinerary design faces the challenge of balancing user experience with minimizing CO<sub>2</sub> emissions.</p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="North-South territorial asymmetry" id="sec26">
        <title>North-South territorial asymmetry</title>
        <p>The reviewed evidence warns of the risk of applying management approaches and carrying capacity models designed for the realities of the Global North to contexts in the Global South. In developing economies, environmental governance coexists with scenarios of high socioeconomic vulnerability and institutional weakness, which demands the urgent contextualization of mitigation tools.</p>
        <p>As a methodological limitation, this study is restricted to records indexed in Scopus using specific search operators. For future research, it is suggested that future studies move beyond descriptive analysis and develop predictive simulation models and mixed methodologies that effectively integrate numerical indicators of recreation ecology with the dimensions of social well-being and participatory governance of local and Indigenous communities marginalized by ecotourism development.</p>
      </sec>
    </sec>
  </body>
  <back>
    <ack>
      <title>Acknowledgments</title>
      <p>The authors thank the professors and library staff of the University of Manizales for the information provided for this bibliometric analysis of protected areas. The authors also thank the Regional Autonomous Corporation of Tolima, the University of Tolima, the Mayor’s Office of Ibague, and its professionals for providing us with information, plans, and data, which allowed us to properly carry out the review work in the protected areas.</p>
    </ack>
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    <sec sec-type="Additional information" id="sec27">
      <title>Additional information</title>
      <sec sec-type="Conflict of interest" id="sec28">
        <title>Conflict of interest</title>
        <p>The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.</p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Ethical statement" id="sec29">
        <title>Ethical statement</title>
        <p>No ethical statement was reported.</p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Artificial Intelligence (AI) use" id="sec30">
        <title>Artificial Intelligence (AI) use</title>
        <p>The authors accept full responsibility for the content of the manuscript, including the disclosure of any use of AI.</p>
        <p>No AI tools were used in the preparation of this manuscript.</p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Funding" id="sec31">
        <title>Funding</title>
        <p>This research received no external funding.</p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Author contributions" id="sec32">
        <title>Author contributions</title>
        <p>J.A.H., Conceptualization, Methodology, Formal analysis, Investigation, Resources, Data curation, Writing – original draft preparation, Writing – review and editing, Visualization, Project administration. J.O.O., Conceptualization, Methodology, Formal analysis, Investigation, Writing – review and editing, Visualization and G.Y.F., Conceptualization, Methodology, Software, Validation, Resources, Writing – review and editing, Visualization, Supervision. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.</p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Author ORCIDs" id="sec33">
        <title>Author ORCIDs</title>
        <p>J.A.H. Briñez <ext-link xlink:href="https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6282-1566" ext-link-type="uri">https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6282-1566</ext-link></p>
        <p>G.Y.F. Yepes <ext-link xlink:href="https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4185-0178" ext-link-type="uri">https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4185-0178</ext-link></p>
        <p>J.O. Ospino <ext-link xlink:href="https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4234-7630" ext-link-type="uri">https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4234-7630</ext-link></p>
      </sec>
      <sec sec-type="Data availability" id="sec34">
        <title>Data availability</title>
        <p>For further information, readers are encouraged to contact the corresponding author.</p>
      </sec>
    </sec>
  </back>
</article>
