A viral video and pet lemurs on Twitter

Content shared on social media platforms can impact public perceptions of wildlife. These perceptions, which are in part shaped by context (e.g. non-naturalistic setting, presence of a human), can influence people’s desires to interact with or acquire wild animals as pets. However, few studies have examined whether this holds true for wild animals featured in viral videos. This study reports on opportunistic data collected on Twitter before, during, and after a video that featured a habituated ring-tailed lemur (Lemur catta), called “Sefo”, in southern Madagascar went ‘viral’ (i.e. circulated rapidly on the internet). Our dataset of 13,953 tweets (from an 18.5-week time period in early 2016) referencing lemurs was collected using targeted keywords on the Twitonomy Service. We identified 613 individual tweets about people wanting a lemur as a pet. In addition, 744 tweets that were captured in our dataset linked to the Sefo viral video. We found that as the number of tweets about the viral video increased, so did the number of tweets where an individual wanted to have a lemur as a pet. Most tweets (91%) did not make reference to a specific species of lemur, but when they did, they often (82%) referenced ring-tailed lemurs (L. catta), ruffed lemurs (Varecia spp.), and mouse lemurs (Microcebus spp.). This study serves as a case study to consider how viral content can impact how wild animals are perceived. We close by noting that social media sites like Twitter, which are increasingly providing their users with news and information, should carefully consider how information about wild animals is shared on their platforms, as it may impact animal welfare.

社交媒体平台上分享的内容，会影响公众对野生动物的认知。这类认知在一定程度上受场景语境影响（例如非自然化的环境、人类在场），会左右人们与野生动物互动，或将其作为宠物饲养的意愿。然而，鲜有研究探讨这类影响是否适用于病毒式传播视频中的野生动物。本研究针对2016年初一段在马达加斯加南部拍摄的、名为"Sefo"的习惯化环尾狐猴（Lemur catta）病毒式传播视频，采集了该视频传播前、中、后三个阶段的推特（Twitter）便利采样数据。本数据集通过Twitonomy服务平台的定向关键词检索收集得到，涵盖2016年初18.5周时段内共计13953条提及狐猴的推文。其中共识别出613条内容为用户希望将狐猴作为宠物饲养的推文；此外，本数据集中共收录744条与"Sefo"病毒式传播视频相关的推文。研究发现，提及该病毒式传播视频的推文数量增长的同时，用户希望饲养狐猴作为宠物的推文数量也随之增加。绝大多数推文（91%）未提及具体的狐猴物种，但在提及具体物种的推文中，有82%的内容指向环尾狐猴（L. catta）、领狐猴属（Varecia spp.）以及倭狐猴属（Microcebus spp.）。本研究作为一项案例分析，探讨了病毒式传播内容如何影响公众对野生动物的认知。最后，本研究指出，诸如推特（Twitter）这类日益成为用户获取新闻与信息渠道的社交媒体平台，应当审慎考量其平台上野生动物相关信息的分享方式，因为这类信息可能会对动物福利造成影响。