scholarly journals Nature-based Tourism or Mass Tourism in Nature? Segmentation of Mountain Protected Area Visitors Using Self-Organizing Maps (SOM)

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (5) ◽  
pp. 1314 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karolina Taczanowska ◽  
Luis-Millán González ◽  
Xavier García-Massó ◽  
Antoni Zięba ◽  
Christiane Brandenburg ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Protected Areas ◽  
Protected Area ◽  
National Park ◽  
Total Sample ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Self Organizing Map ◽  
Self Organizing Maps ◽  
Mass Tourism ◽  
Tatra National Park ◽  
Self Organizing

Mountain protected areas play a fundamental role in the conservation of natural environment and at the same time provide the population with social benefits such as offering space for leisure and recreation. Understanding motivations and behavior of protected area visitors is crucial to effectively manage vulnerable areas. Our objective was to identify the profiles of visitors to a heavily used tourist destination—Kasprowy Wierch within the Tatra National Park (Poland), using the self-organizing maps (SOM) analytical method. In order to explore the socio-demographic and behavioral characteristics of the visitors a total sample of 2488 respondents were interviewed on site. Self-organizing map analysis is based on cerebral processes for managing and storing information in order to classify subjects and/or find relationships among variables. As a result, four heterogeneous tourist profiles were identified. Interestingly, two of these groups (Cluster 1 and Cluster 3), which were found to be the most challenging groups for management purposes, visited the national park for reasons other than its natural attractions. Especially, one sub-segment of Cluster 3 was mainly motivated by the possibility to use a cable car, admiring views and stayed within close proximity of the upper cable car station. Less than a half of visitors to Kasprowy Wierch (42%) were seeking a nature experience during their trip (Cluster 2 and Cluster 4). The results bring a new point of view in the discussion on visitor management within Kasprowy Wierch region, in particular by overlapping presented visitor segmentation with trip types and/or purchased cable car tickets. Within international context, we highlight the SOM technique as a valuable tool in profiling of tourists and underline the problem of the existence of mass tourism destinations within protected areas.

scholarly journals Mass tourism in protected areas – underestimated threat? Polish National Parks case study

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 1046-1060
Author(s):  
Krzysztof Widawski ◽  
Zdzisław Jary
Keyword(s):  
Protected Areas ◽  
National Parks ◽  
National Park ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Mass Tourism ◽  
External Threats ◽  
Balanced Approach ◽  
Table Mountains ◽  
Tourist Flow

Abstract The article considers the tourist traffic as possible to elements of inanimate nature in protected areas. The highest form of protection in Poland - national parks, has been taken into account. The main goal is to diagnose the situation based on the analysis of official documents elaborated by the national park authorities. One of the important elements is to diagnose the threat to nature and indicate ways to neutralize it. At the beginning, the geotouristic potential of these parks was presented, where this type of resources is considered important from the point of view of tourism. The tourist function of the most important attractions in Poland was indicated. In the top ten there are as many as 4 national parks, including Tatrzański which takes first place. The size of tourist traffic in all 23 parks was analyzed. As a result, it was shown that the most popular, where tourist flow is of mass character, include mountain parks with significant geotouristic potential. Next, the current protection plans for them were analyzed: Tatrzański, Karkonoski, Table Mountains and Pieniński, where the annual tourist flow varies between 0.5 million and almost 4 million visitors per year. Threats were assigned to 4 groups: existing internal threats, potential internal threats, existing external threats and potential external threats. In each of the types of threats special attention was paid to those related to inanimate nature. It also indicated the ways in which park managers want to influence the change of negative trends. The basic conclusion was indicated, which boils down to the postulate of a balanced approach to the protection of both types of nature: animate and inanimate. In the case of animate nature, threats and suggestions for improving the situation seem to be much better diagnosed than in the case of inanimate nature.

scholarly journals Attractiveness of protected areas for geotourism purposes from the perspective of visitors: the example of Babiogórski National Park (Poland)

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 358-366 ◽  
Author(s):  
Krzysztof Widawski ◽  
Zdzisław Jary ◽  
Piotr Oleśniewicz ◽  
Piotr Owczarek ◽  
Julita Markiewicz-Patkowska ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Protected Areas ◽  
National Parks ◽  
Protected Area ◽  
National Park ◽  
Legal Protection ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Many

AbstractThis article examines the tourist role of protected areas important for their unanimated nature potential. In Poland the highest form of legal protection is a national park. Babiogórski National Parks is one of 23 national parks in Poland. The aim of this article is to present its tourist attraction based on its geotourist potential considered by tourists who visit this park. At the beginning a brief history of protection of Babia Góra is presented. Based on stock-taking sightseeing method an analysis of the most important tourist attractiveness elements (like infrastructure or tourist values) is done. The focus on the values of unanimated nature is made grouping them into four main categories. As the result of research on infrastructure the most important accommodation units were indicated present at the surroundings of this National Park which is vital for its tourist capacity. For the correct functioning of tourist movement at the protected area the supporting infrastructure is important bearing a lot of functions. The function of channeling of the tourist movement as well as the didactic function are the most important for protection and correct use of geotourist values. Among the many elements of the supporting infrastructure the most important ones are tourist and didactic routes (their course and themes are presented). The most important part of the article is the presentation of the participants of the tourist movement opinions on the Babiogórski National Park tourist attractiveness. A survey was conducted and then analysed on 308 respondents in 2011. They were asked to judge both the quality of infrastructure as well as attraction of geotourist values together with their adaptation to reception by the tourist movement. The results analysis served as a base to appraise the state and perspectives for the geotourism development in Babiogórski National Park from the point of view of the receivers of tourist product i.e. the protected area.

Credit Rating Classification Using Self-Organizing Maps

2002 ◽  
pp. 140-153 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger P.G.H. Tan ◽  
Jan van den Berg ◽  
Willem-Max van den Bergh
Keyword(s):  
Credit Rating ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The Self ◽  
Self Organizing Map ◽  
Self Organizing Maps ◽  
Self Organizing

In this case study, we apply the Self-Organizing Map (SOM) technique to a financial business problem. The case study is mainly written from an investor’s point of view giving much attention to the insights provided by the unique visualization capabilities of the SOM. The results are compared to results from other, more common, econometric techniques. Because of limitations of space, our description is quite compact in several places. For those interested in more details, we refer to Tan (2000).

scholarly journals The Spread of the COVID-19 Outbreak in Brazil: An Overview by Kohonen Self-Organizing Map Networks

Medicina ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 57 (3) ◽  
pp. 235
Author(s):  
Diego Galvan ◽  
Luciane Effting ◽  
Hágata Cremasco ◽  
Carlos Adam Conte-Junior
Keyword(s):  
The Self ◽  
Self Organizing Map ◽  
Virus Spread ◽  
Self Organizing Maps ◽  
The North ◽  
Som Clustering ◽  
Unsupervised Neural Networks ◽  
Mining Tools ◽  
Temporal Spread ◽  
Self Organizing

Background and objective: In the current pandemic scenario, data mining tools are fundamental to evaluate the measures adopted to contain the spread of COVID-19. In this study, unsupervised neural networks of the Self-Organizing Maps (SOM) type were used to assess the spatial and temporal spread of COVID-19 in Brazil, according to the number of cases and deaths in regions, states, and cities. Materials and methods: The SOM applied in this context does not evaluate which measures applied have helped contain the spread of the disease, but these datasets represent the repercussions of the country’s measures, which were implemented to contain the virus’ spread. Results: This approach demonstrated that the spread of the disease in Brazil does not have a standard behavior, changing according to the region, state, or city. The analyses showed that cities and states in the north and northeast regions of the country were the most affected by the disease, with the highest number of cases and deaths registered per 100,000 inhabitants. Conclusions: The SOM clustering was able to spatially group cities, states, and regions according to their coronavirus cases, with similar behavior. Thus, it is possible to benefit from the use of similar strategies to deal with the virus’ spread in these cities, states, and regions.

scholarly journals Geospatial Analysis of Extreme Weather Events in Nigeria (1985–2015) Using Self-Organizing Maps

2017 ◽  
Vol 2017 ◽  
pp. 1-11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adeoluwa Akande ◽  
Ana Cristina Costa ◽  
Jorge Mateu ◽  
Roberto Henriques
Keyword(s):  
Extreme Precipitation ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Northern Region ◽  
Extreme Weather Events ◽  
Self Organizing Map ◽  
Spatial And Temporal Patterns ◽  
Self Organizing Maps ◽  
The North ◽  
Precipitation Regimes ◽  
Self Organizing

The explosion of data in the information age has provided an opportunity to explore the possibility of characterizing the climate patterns using data mining techniques. Nigeria has a unique tropical climate with two precipitation regimes: low precipitation in the north leading to aridity and desertification and high precipitation in parts of the southwest and southeast leading to large scale flooding. In this research, four indices have been used to characterize the intensity, frequency, and amount of rainfall over Nigeria. A type of Artificial Neural Network called the self-organizing map has been used to reduce the multiplicity of dimensions and produce four unique zones characterizing extreme precipitation conditions in Nigeria. This approach allowed for the assessment of spatial and temporal patterns in extreme precipitation in the last three decades. Precipitation properties in each cluster are discussed. The cluster closest to the Atlantic has high values of precipitation intensity, frequency, and duration, whereas the cluster closest to the Sahara Desert has low values. A significant increasing trend has been observed in the frequency of rainy days at the center of the northern region of Nigeria.

scholarly journals Dynamic Gesture Recognition System with Gesture Spotting Based on Self-Organizing Maps

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 1933
Author(s):  
Hiroomi Hikawa ◽  
Yuta Ichikawa ◽  
Hidetaka Ito ◽  
Yutaka Maeda
Keyword(s):  
Real Time ◽  
Gesture Recognition ◽  
Weight Vector ◽  
Recognition System ◽  
Self Organizing Map ◽  
Self Organizing Maps ◽  
Time Dynamic ◽  
System Input ◽  
Self Organizing ◽  
Gesture Spotting

In this paper, a real-time dynamic hand gesture recognition system with gesture spotting function is proposed. In the proposed system, input video frames are converted to feature vectors, and they are used to form a posture sequence vector that represents the input gesture. Then, gesture identification and gesture spotting are carried out in the self-organizing map (SOM)-Hebb classifier. The gesture spotting function detects the end of the gesture by using the vector distance between the posture sequence vector and the winner neuron’s weight vector. The proposed gesture recognition method was tested by simulation and real-time gesture recognition experiment. Results revealed that the system could recognize nine types of gesture with an accuracy of 96.6%, and it successfully outputted the recognition result at the end of gesture using the spotting result.

A New Method for Emulating Self-Organizing Maps for Visualization of Datasets

2018 ◽  
Vol 17 (03) ◽  
pp. 1850014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Macario O. Cordel ◽  
Arnulfo P. Azcarraga
Keyword(s):  
Disaster Response ◽  
Dimensional Space ◽  
Main Idea ◽  
Cost Effective ◽  
Fine Tuning ◽  
Visualization Tool ◽  
Self Organizing Map ◽  
Text Complexity ◽  
Self Organizing Maps ◽  
Self Organizing

Several time-critical problems relying on large amount of data, e.g., business trends, disaster response and disease outbreak, require cost-effective, timely and accurate data summary and visualization, in order to come up with an efficient and effective decision. Self-organizing map (SOM) is a very effective data clustering and visualization tool as it provides intuitive display of data in lower-dimensional space. However, with [Formula: see text] complexity, SOM becomes inappropriate for large datasets. In this paper, we propose a force-directed visualization method that emulates SOMs capability to display the data clusters with [Formula: see text] complexity. The main idea is to perform a force-directed fine-tuning of the 2D representation of data. To demonstrate the efficiency and the vast potential of the proposed method as a fast visualization tool, the methodology is used to do a 2D-projection of the MNIST handwritten digits dataset.

scholarly journals On building early-warning systems for preventing the deterioration of financial institutions’ performance

2019 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 194-202
Author(s):  
Adrian Costea
Keyword(s):  
Financial Institutions ◽  
Early Warning ◽  
Warning System ◽  
Early Warning Systems ◽  
Capital Adequacy ◽  
Self Organizing Map ◽  
Self Organizing Maps ◽  
Performance Dimensions ◽  
Som Model ◽  
Self Organizing

Abstract This paper assesses the financial performance of Romania’s non-banking financial institutions (NFIs) using a neural network training algorithm proposed by Kohonen, namely the Self-Organizing Maps algorithm. The algorithm takes the financial dataset and positiones each observation into a self-organizing map (a two-dimensional map) which can be latter used to visualize the trajectories of an individual NFI and explain it based on different performance dimensions, such as capital adequacy, assets’ quality and profitability. Further, we use the map as an early-warning system that would accurately forecast the NFIs future performance (whether they would stay or be eliminated from the NFI’s Special Register three quarters into the future). The results are promising: the model is able to correctly predict NFIs’ performance movements. Finally, we compared the results of our SOM-based model with those obtained by applying a multivariate logit-based model. The SOM model performed worse in discriminating the NFIs’ performance: the performance classes were not clearly defined and the model lacked the interpretability of the results. In the contrary, the multivariate logit coefficients have nice interpretability and an individual default probability estimate is obtained for each new observation. However, we can benefit from the results of both techniques: the visualization capabilities of the SOM model and the interpretability of multivariate logit-based model.

scholarly journals Common Birds of Chitwan National Park, Nepal

2017 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 19-26
Author(s):  
Parveen Kumar Jha
Keyword(s):  
Protected Area ◽  
National Park ◽  
Bird Species ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Central Nepal ◽  
South Central ◽  
Tropical Vegetation ◽  
Chitwan National Park ◽  
Common Birds ◽  
Very High

 This research paper gives checklist of common birds of Chitwan National Park, which is a wild-life protected area in south-central Nepal. It covers tropical and sub-tropical vegetation. It is first protected area and includes 932 sq. km. Common birds observed are about 170 belonging to 48 Avian families during 2013-2014. Present investigator has very minutely observed birds in habitat conditions. Bird species were recognized by very high binocular. Birds were thoroughly studied from point of view of Taxonomy. Machans were also erected for observing birds.

scholarly journals Geodiversity map of the Tatra National Park for geotourism

2012 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 99-107 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zbigniew Zwoliński ◽  
Jakub Stachowiak
Keyword(s):  
National Park ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Tatra Mountains ◽  
Thematic Layers ◽  
Park Area ◽  
Tatra National Park ◽  
The Tatra Mountains

Geodiversity map of the Tatra National Park for geotourism The paper indicates the relations between geodiversity and geotourism in the Tatra National Park. Geodiversity of the Tatra Mountains is visualized by its geodiversity map, whereas geotouristic attractions are measured by touristic attractions along touristic trails on geodiversity map. Areas of the highest geodiversity cover merely 8.2% of the Tatar National Park area. These are mainly areas close to the Tatra Mountains' main ridge. It is so due to geology, landform energy, slopes, landform fragmentation and geoecological belts. Most of the analyzed thematic layers categorizes ridges as more geodiversed than valley areas. The trails situated in the valley bottoms usually cross by areas of low geodiversity, however, from geotouristic point of view, it should be noted that slopes and ridges circumvolving the valley can be marked by high geodiversity. The mountain slopes and ridges are within tourist's sight, what increases trail's geotouristic attractiveness. Amongst many geotouristically interesting parts of the Tatra Mountains Dolina Pięciu Stawów valley appears to be the most appealing with its high quantity and high variety of post-glacial forms on valley's bottom as well as on its slopes.

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