The role of cultural and demographic diversity in crowding perception: Evidence from nature reserves in Israel

Department of Geography, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Mount Scopus, Jerusalem 91905, Israel Crowding perceptions in natural settings, such as nature reserves, are an outcome of encounters between visitors to those settings. The implications of such encounters are mediated by the cultural diversity and demographic attributes of both parties to each encounter. This study explores the influence of visitors' cultural and demographic attributes and the degree of similarity between visitors and those encountered by them, on perceived crowding in two popular nature reserves in Israel. Using binary and multinomial choice models, it is seen that in Israel younger, better educated visitors of European and American descent are less tolerant of crowding than those who are older and/or of Asian-African descent. Our findings demonstrate that visitors' alikeness in terms of educational and ethnic background tends to lessen crowding perception, while demographic resemblance between the parties to encounters (primarily in terms of age) results in greater sensitivity to crowding. The findings of this study have implications for the management of nature reserves, and these are discussed here as well.