Australians’ perceptions of species diversity of, and threats to, the Great Barrier Reef

Introduction

The Great Barrier Reef (GBR), located in Queensland Australia, is the largest coral reef system in the world covering 344,400 km². The GBR is a World Heritage Area, so as to protect it for future generations, and is considered one of the seven natural wonders of the world (see the UNESCO World Heritage List at https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/). The GBR supports over 6000 species of corals, fish (including many shark and ray species), molluscs, sea snakes, birds, sea turtles and marine mammals (Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority 2022).

The GBR is important to Australia environmentally, economically, culturally and scientifically (for a comprehensive overview, see Carr and Mendelsohn 2003; Stoeckl et al. 2011). In 2015–2016, the GBR contributed A$6.4 billion and over 64,000 jobs (direct and indirect) into the Australian economy (O’Mahoney et al. 2017 ) through tourism activities. Even during the COVID-19 pandemic, in 2021, more than 1 million tourists visited the GBR (Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority 2022). Because many tourists visit the GBR to experience the ecosystem, Ceccarelli and Ayling (Ceccarelli and Ayling 2010) found that declines in coral and fish biodiversity on the GBR could reduce visitor numbers by as much as 80% which would correspond to a loss of A$103 million in tourism revenue alone.

Most threats to the GBR are anthropogenic rather than naturogenic (e.g. outbreaks of coral-eating crown-of-thorns starfish; Green et al. 1999; Pratchett et al. 2017), and include climate change, coastal development, agricultural and runoff pollution, unsustainable fishing practices, and unsustainable tourism practices (e.g. Starck 2005; Pearson et al. 2021; Walpole and Hadwen 2022). Given the multifaceted importance of the GBR, and the various anthropogenic threats facing the health and prosperity of this World Heritage site, it is important to understand people’s knowledge and perceptions of these reefs (Gooch et al. 2017; Manfredo et al. 2021).

Research published in a technical report from over 20 years ago found that approximately half of the sample (n = 1003), in a randomised telephone survey, living in either Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Canberra or adjacent the GBR, stated that they believed the most serious threats to the GBR were pollution and rubbish, general human impact, tourism, and crown-of-thorns starfish (Green et al. 1999). An Australian government report, which measured attitudes and awareness of the GBR found that northern Queensland residents stated that water pollution was the biggest threat to the GBR, whereas residents from Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney reported climate change and coral bleaching as the biggest threat (Young and Temperton 2008). Updated research in this space is required, because these earlier studies provide a snapshot in time that is more than a decade old.

Understanding and increasing the public’s knowledge is an important aspect of conservation research and initiatives, especially given that many conservation programs rely on the Information Deficit Model, where information transfers from scientists to lay audiences so as to address gaps in knowledge (e.g. Suldovsky 2017). Indeed, improving ocean literacy as a way of engaging communities in conservation and pro-environmental behaviour is receiving attention as scientists and policy-makers struggle with maintaining healthy oceans (Paredes-Coral et al. 2021; Cavas et al. 2023). Even though, alone, adequate knowledge about an issue is not sufficient to change human behaviour (McKenzie-Mohr 2000), it is necessary in facilitating engagement in conservation issues. It is therefore important to understand what Australians know about the GBR, the species that reside there, and about the threats to the GBR ecosystem. Specifically, this research investigates the following:

Methods

Results

Why do participants believe the GBR is important to Australia?

The most common environmental importance factors identified by participants (Fig. 1) include that the GBR is an important habitat for a range of species (48%), that it is a natural wonder associated with Australia (27%) and that is in an important ecosystem (24%). The socio-cultural factors that make the GBR important to Australia stated by the participants (Fig. 2) are that the GBR is a well-known tourist attraction (44%), it brings in money for the Australian economy (9%) and that it is an area for scientific research opportunities (4%).

Fig. 1.

Word-cloud representation of the Great Barrier Reef’s environmental importance to Australia.

Fig. 2.

Word-cloud representation of the Great Barrier Reef’s socio-cultural importance to Australia.

What species do participants think live in the GBR?

As already mentioned, participants rarely provided nomenclature for marine fauna or flora at the species level. The most frequent broad taxon categories listed were fish (37%), reptiles (12%) and corals (12%). Sea turtles and sharks were the only more specific class taxon categories present in 10% of responses or more, and clownfish was the most frequently reported species (3.9%; see Fig. 3).

Fig. 3.

Most common taxa and species that live on GBR reported by participants.

What threats do participants think the GBR is facing?

Runoff, pollution and plastics (36%), coral bleaching (34%), climate change (33%) and warming oceans (24%) were all commonly mentioned threats to the GBR. Of 18 threats reported by participants, only 3 were naturogenic threats (crown-of-thorns starfish, natural disasters and sea urchins), whereas the remaining threats were all anthropogenic in nature (see Fig. 4).

Fig. 4.

Word-cloud representation of threats to the Great Barrier Reef identified by participants.

Discussion

This research used qualitative data to explore knowledge of the GBR, which is an ecosystem that is particularly important to Australia and is facing various threats. Most participants correctly identified that the GBR is located in the Australian state of Queensland, and listed various environmental and socio-cultural reasons for why the GBR is important to Australia. This recognition of ecosystem importance underscores the holistic understanding required for addressing complex challenges, such as climate change. Recognition of the interconnectedness between socio-cultural and environmental factors allows for development of comprehensive strategies that protect the environmental health of the GBR while also promoting the well-being of the communities that depend on it.

It is not surprising that although participants in our study listed numerous types of marine life for the GBR, among the most frequent responses were fish and coral. Images of both coral and fishes have long been used in tourism campaigns for the GBR and also in ‘Save the Reef’ campaigns, dating back to the 1970s (Foxwell-Norton and Konkes 2022). This reliance on coral and fishes in campaigns may explain our finding, because the consistent use of images are powerful in shaping perceptions (Coghlan et al. 2017). In terms of ocean literacy, specifically taxonomic classification, the participants in our study rarely listed flora or fauna at the species level, but instead provided broad or common names, which suggests that participants did not know, or were unsure of, the definition of ‘species’. It is important to note that we were not expecting participants to provide the scientific name for the species, but instead were wanting to see whether participants would identify flora and fauna at a more niche species level (e.g. reef shark, instead of shark). The most common specific species identified was clownfish, which was the seventh-most common response. This may have been a popular response owing to media portrayals in Finding Nemo, which was based on the GBR. The popularity of Finding Nemo is consistent with how digital media, and popular culture, can raise the public profile of charismatic species, which can lead to conservation support (Clark and May 2002). In this sense, clownfish are a flagship species for the GBR, which is the use of a ‘cute’ species to draw attention to an ecosystem (Smith and Sutton 2008). It is also interesting to note that three of the ‘Great 8’ GBR species (Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority 2022) were commonly listed, namely, clownfish, sharks and sea turtles, whereas manta rays, giant clams, whales and Māori wrasse species were infrequently listed by participants and there were no mentions of potato cod. The ‘Great 8’ is a tourism initiative, akin to the ‘Big 5’ in Africa (Caro and Riggio 2014), where eight common species on the GBR are promoted to reflect ‘the diversity and beauty of the World Heritage Listed Marine Park’ (Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority 2022); however, from our results it is clear that many of these species selected are not well known. Further, only three species that are classified by the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List of Threatened Species as Endangered or Critically Endangered were identified, namely, the green turtle (Chelonia mydas, Endangered; Seminoff 2023), staghorn coral (Acropora cervicornis, Critically Endangered; Crabbe et al. 2022) and the great hammerhead shark (Sphyrna mokarran, Critically Endangered; Rigby et al. 2019). Fewer than 1% of responses included birds (sea birds and seagulls), when the GBR supports breeding populations of 20 seabird species (Congdon 2019; Woodworth et al. 2021). This finding highlights the need for more education of endangered and critically endangered species living in the GBR, which are under threat from human activities.

It is important to note that this study utilised a convenience sample recruited by social media advertisements. However, attempts were made to increase the generalisability of the sample by using a snowballing approach and posting the advertisements on various types of social media accounts and pages. The purpose of this research was to broadly explore people’s knowledge of the GBR, which is why open-ended questions were used to collect qualitative data. This kind of text-based data provide new insights into peoples’ knowledge, because no prompts were provided. This is linked to memory retrieval, and whether the measure is based on recognition or recall of information. For example, if a list of species was provided to participants, for them to select which ones they are aware of, this would measure recognition, which is easier. Open-ended questions without prompts, require recall of knowledge of species or recognition of animals, which is harder. However, the combination of using open-ended items and having a smaller sample, affects the generalisability of our results and our ability to conduct comparison analyses to look at differences between demographics (Neuendorf 2018), because this typically requires larger samples and quantitative data. Importantly, on the basis of our qualitative findings, Likert scales could be developed to explore participants’ knowledge of threats to GBR, importance of GBR and species in the GBR. This will allow future research to explore knowledge of the GBR in a broader sample where demographic comparisons can be tested.

Conclusions

This study was able to extend the knowledge base from Green et al. (1999) and Young and Temperton (2008) with current data from Australians in 2022 and contribute new findings. As a snapshot of Australian ocean literacy specific to the GBR, this study has provided preliminary evidence of limited knowledge of species that live in the GBR, and basic broad knowledge of threats to the GBR. Although unable to mention specific species that lived in the GBR, participants recognised the importance of the GBR as an ecosystem. Surprisingly, ~6% of the participants did not know where the GBR was located. These findings help identify existing knowledge gaps in public awareness or literacy related to the GBR and marine biodiversity. Understanding Australians knowledge of the GBR and which species are well known allows resources to be assigned to specific areas to increase public awareness including targeted education and outreach programs. Future studies should seek to survey a larger number of participants that are more representative of the Australian population as a whole.