Protected Area Effectiveness in the Scientific Literature: A Decade-Long Bibliometric Analysis

Javier Martínez-Vega and David Rodríguez-Rodríguez
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Javier Martínez-Vega: Institute of Economy, Geography and Demography, Spanish Research Council (IEGD-CSIC), 28037 Madrid, Spain
David Rodríguez-Rodríguez: European Topic Centre, University of Malaga, 29010 Malaga, Spain

Land, 2022, vol. 11, issue 6, 1-14

Abstract: Protected areas (PAs) aim to safeguard biodiversity and ecosystem services in the long term. Despite remarkable growth in the area covered by PAs in recent years, biodiversity trends still show worrisome outcomes. Here, we conducted a systematic literature review (SLR) of scientific articles focusing on the ecological effectiveness of PAs that were published in the 2010–2019 decade using Scopus in order to show the latest publication trends in that research field. After three consecutive screenings, we analyzed a final census sample of 76 articles that used semiexperimental research designs. We assessed 3 thematic variables (i.e., related to ecological effectiveness) and 13 bibliometric variables through descriptive statistics, Spearman correlation tests, and Kruskal–Wallis difference tests. Our results demonstrate the growing size of research teams working on this topic, broader international collaboration, and greater length of the articles published on this subject. During that decade, the number of normalized citations (+28%) and the mean field-weighted citation impact (FWCI) of the set of reviewed articles (33% higher than expected) increased. We also observed an increase in open access publications (+13%). However, this mode of publication did not ensure more citations. Finally, we observed a positive correlation between the number of normalized citations and the inclusion of Supplementary Data in the articles.

Keywords: biodiversity conservation; ecological effectiveness; terrestrial realm; marine realm; systematic literature review (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q15 Q2 Q24 Q28 Q5 R14 R52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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