Communicating sustainable tourism in key of social representations: a pilot study on instagram, facebook and twitter

Theoretical background. The contribution focuses on Sustainable Tourism in light of the Social Representations Theory. Social Representations (SR) are defined as systems of shared meanings, values and beliefs, symbols and emotions connected to collective memories and attitudinal dimensions related to social practices and actions that enable individuals to construct meaningful knowledge about the social reality. Aims. The purpose is to analyze the communication about Sustainable Tourism identifying which type of post (written post, photo or video) is the most common among the hashtags considered, the words and the emoticons used in the captions on the Social Networks: Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Method. Through the use of six hashtags (sustainable tourism, ecotourism, responsible tourism, rural tourism, nature-based tourism, green tourism) the contribution analyses posts published in English on the three Social Networks in 2021. The analysis was made through the IRAMUTEQ software. Results. The Descending Hierarchical Classification produced five thematic classes: introducing destination, anticipating the travel experience, moving from anticipation to the travel experience, focusing on ecotourism and responsible tourism. Following the definition of Social Representations sustainable tourism (as it emerges in the captions of the analysed Social Networks) includes the emotional and value dimensions. Moreover, the reconstruction of SR makes use of fascinating stories, sometimes sinking into local cultures and traditions. Conclusions. This study condenses the thematic object of Sustainable Tourism and the interest in Social Networks. Serge Moscovici (1925 2014) only partially experienced the advent and diffusion of the Internet, but he had already provided an anticipatory proposal: the social scientist underlined the importance of investigating new phenomena of online communication by studying cybercommunication. Social Networks, moreover, nowadays, flank -and have partially replaced- those traditional meeting places, such as the Parisian cafés, considered by Moscovici to be real social laboratories for the production and transformation of SR.