2025, Vol. 6, Issue 2, Part A
Public attitudes toward human-wildlife conflict in Northern and Southern India: A twitter-based comparative analysis
Author(s): Ravi Krishnan CJ and Soundra Rajan D
Abstract: Human-wildlife conflict is an escalating issue in India as expanding agriculture and settlements bring people into closer contact with wildlife. Animals like elephants, leopards, and tigers increasingly raid crops, attack livestock, and in some cases injure or kill people, provoking widespread concern. Social media platforms such as Twitter now serve as key venues for public discourse on these conflicts. In this study, we compared how residents of North India (e.g. Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh) and South India (e.g. Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka) express their views on wildlife encounters via Twitter. We assembled a dataset of 1,000 tweets (500 geotagged to North India and 500 to South India) using keywords related to animal attacks and conflicts. Each tweet was rated on a 5-point sentiment scale (1=strongly negative; 5=strongly positive). The results reveal a clear regional disparity: tweets from South India carried a significantly more positive tone (mean sentiment ≈ 2.54) than those from North India (mean ≈ 2.12; Welch’s p<0.001). This suggests that public attitudes differ markedly between regions, likely reflecting variations in conflict frequency, mitigation efforts, and public awareness. Our findings underscore the value of social media analysis for capturing environmental attitudes and suggest that tailored, region-specific conservation policies may be needed to address human-wildlife conflicts.
DOI: 10.22271/27084450.2025.v6.i2a.118
Pages: 30-33 | Views: 672 | Downloads: 295
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How to cite this article:
Ravi Krishnan CJ and Soundra Rajan D. Public attitudes toward human-wildlife conflict in Northern and Southern India: A twitter-based comparative analysis. International Journal of Advanced Mass Communication and Journalism. 2025; 6(2): 30-33. DOI: 10.22271/27084450.2025.v6.i2a.118
