How are non-perennial streams depicted by mass media? The influence of a catastrophic flood

ABSTRACT

Despite our deepening knowledge of non-perennial streams, they are still poorly recognized, and people still perceive them as less valuable and less worthy of conservation than perennial streams. Due to its power to shape attitudes and opinions, mass media plays a critical role, which can also contribute to improving perceptions regarding non-perennial streams. Here, we aim to analyse how non-perennial streams are depicted by mass media in the Balearic Islands and how a catastrophic flood influenced mass media communication about these ecosystems. We analysed all news reports related to streams, published in the most read online newspaper of the Balearic Islands, for 25 months (12 months before and after the catastrophic flood). A total of 407 news reports were analyzed to identify the topics covered (e.g. floods, ecology, stream uses, water quality). News reports related to non-perennial streams focused on past floods and their consequences; our analyses showed how the catastrophic flood event affected the news temporal agenda, as well as the territorial inequalities in media coverage. News reports rarely covered ecological aspects of non-perennial streams or their relevance for freshwater resources. We concluded that news reports contribute to generating a collective memory around flood events but also contribute to social misconception about non-perennial streams.

Edited by:

• Isabelle Durance

KEYWORDS:

• Climate change
• intermittent streams
• mass media
• environmental communication
• flood risk management

1. Introduction

Non-perennial streams are those watercourses that cease to flow at some point in time and space. It is a broad category, defined as opposed to perennial streams and, thus, it includes all streams that do not present perennial surface flow – from streams that always present surface water but are temporarily reduced to disconnected pools to ephemeral streams that flow only after large rainfall events, while remaining dry most of the time. Recent estimates concluded that non-perennial streams account for approximately 50% of the world’s river network length, and their frequency is expected to increase under climate and land cover change (Messager et al. 2021).

Non-perennial streams have been historically overlooked, compared to perennial streams, but attention to these systems has increased in the last decades (Leigh et al. 2016). Recent research has demonstrated that these ecosystems contribute highly to biodiversity in several ways, such as hosting unique aquatic organisms with adaptations against the absence of surface water and desiccation (Sarremejane et al. 2017) and acting as refuge and corridors for terrestrial fauna (Sánchez-Montoya et al. 2015, 2022). Moreover, they play an important role in biogeochemical cycles (von Schiller et al. 2019) and provide diverse ecosystem services to human populations that are linked to their hydrology, such as freshwater provision, groundwater recharge, and recreational services (Kaletova et al. 2021; Nicolás-Ruiz et al. 2021). Despite our deepening knowledge of non-perennial streams, these ecosystems are still poorly recognized, and people still perceive them as less valuable and less worthy of conservation than perennial streams (Rodríguez-Lozano et al. 2020).

In this vein, mass media can contribute to improving knowledge, perceptions, and attitudes towards non-perennial streams. Mass media is a powerful communication tool due to its ability to reach the public (Ferguson 2000; Gitlin 2003) and shape the perception and opinion of citizens (Campbell and Jamieson 1992; Cockerill 2003). Consequently, there has been an increasing interest in analysing mass media coverage of environmental topics (e.g. Cologna et al. 2017; Bombieri et al. 2018; Mammola et al. 2020). Regarding streams, Weber et al. (2017) analysed how ecosystem services provided by streams (not focused on non-perennial streams) were depicted in three U.S. media sources, finding that the most common topics were water quantity and quality, fish, wildlife, and vegetation, and that the most common ecosystem service was water provision. They also found that the two mainstream newspapers more frequently discussed water quality issues and recreational uses, while the environmental source emphasized water supply scarcity, aquatic life, and endangered species. However, the role of mass media in communicating the ecological values of non-perennial streams and their contributions to human well-being is still unknown because there is not yet any published research on how mass media depicts non-perennial streams.

Mass media can also worsen negative perceptions towards non-perennial streams if the negative impacts of floods in human societies is amplified (Cologna et al. 2017). In the last few years, natural hazards caused by meteorological and climate events have increased worldwide (Han and Kuhlicke 2019) jeopardising lives and human well-being. Between 2001 and 2018, about 74% of all natural disasters were water related and, during the past 20 years, the total number of deaths caused only by floods and droughts exceed 166,000 (UNESCO 2020). Stream floods are a matter of concern because of the economic and human losses they entail (Marchi et al. 2010). Moreover, it is projected that climate change will likely increase flood risk through changes in local patterns of rainfall and the frequency and duration of storms (Jha et al. 2012), which constitutes a major challenge in urban spaces (Alves et al. 2020). Flood risk is an unresolved issue that will tend to worsen in the short term due to climate change. Therefore, how flood risk and impacts of non-perennial streams are shown in the media can also influence how non-perennial streams are perceived.

This study focuses on the non-perennial streams of the Balearic Islands (Spain). It is worth noting that all streams in the Balearic Islands are non-perennial streams. The non-perennial streams of the Balearic Islands present small basins and short storm hydrograph lag times, which complicates flood risk forecasting. Thus, the Balearic Islands are a good case study to analyze how mass media depicts non-perennial streams. A recent catastrophic flood event on a non-perennial stream covered by mass media was the flood disaster of Sant Llorenç in Mallorca (Balearic Islands, Spain). In October 2018, the non-perennial stream of Ses Planes flooded and caused tragic consequences (Lorenzo-Lacruz et al. 2019).

The overarching goal of this study was to analyse how non-perennial streams are depicted by mass media in the Balearic Islands, as well as how a catastrophic flood may influence the mass media coverage of non-perennial streams. We aimed to identify both the main topics related to non-perennial streams covered by mass media and the missing topics, paying special attention to their temporal and spatial distribution. To achieve this goal, we analysed all news reports related to non-perennial streams, published in the most read newspaper from the Balearic Islands over 25 months: October 2018, when the flash flood event occurred, 12 months before that event, and 12 months after that event. This design allowed us to analysed the influence of the catastrophic flood on mass media coverage of non-perennial streams.

2. Methods

2.1. Study area

The archipelago of the Balearic Islands is located in the western Mediterranean. It has four major islands (Mallorca, Menorca, Ibiza, and Formentera) and several islets (Figure 1). The island of Mallorca is the largest (3640 km²) and can be classified in six geographical areas (slightly modified from the original of Rosselló-Verger 1964): Tramuntana, Palma, Raiguer, Pla de Mallorca, Migjorn, and Llevant (Figure 1).

Figure 1. Location of the Balearic Islands.

The Balearic Islands have the typical climate of the western Mediterranean – irregular precipitation throughout the year, with a maximum in fall and spring and a warm period in summer. Annual precipitation varies from 1400 mm/year in the Tramuntana region (Mallorca island) to 300 mm/year in southeast Mallorca (López Mayol et al. 2016). This Mediterranean climate, together with a permeable lithology, causes all streams that drain the island to be non-perennial, which are called locally ‘torrents’. These streams can be intermittent, with base flow from the beginning of fall to late spring, fed by springs or ephemeral, flowing only after large rainfall events, while remaining dry most of the time (García et al. 2017). These streams host great biodiversity, which is adapted to periods without surface water (García et al. 2017). The geographical isolation of the Balearic Islands leads to a high level of endemism inhabiting the non-perennial streams, such as the midwife toad of Mallorca (Alytes muletensis); only a few breeding populations persist in isolated pools of streams (Moore et al. 2004) and several aquatic invertebrate species (Pardo and Zwick 1993; Álvarez and Pardo 2007). Despite the natural intermittency of the streams, a recent study (García et al. 2017) demonstrated that the number of zero-flow days in Tramuntana streams is increasing, owing to forest expansion and an increase in temperature, which affects its associated biodiversity (Álvarez and Pardo 2007; García et al. 2017). It is also noticeable that recreational activities occur in several streams (especially in the Tramuntana region), including canyoning, which is regulated by the regional government. In this article, we used the terminology ‘non-perennial streams’ to refer to all the rivers and streams of the Balearic Islands, independent of their size and degree of intermittency.

Floods are recurrent in the streams of the Balearic Islands and are an important component of the hydrological variability of non-perennial streams. In this context, it is necessary to mention that the last catastrophic flash flood occurred on 9 October 2018, where almost all possible dangerous factors converged, generating tragic consequences. Specifically, a large flash flood, caused by a heavy rainstorm, transported sediment and debris along the Torrent de Ses Planes in Sant Llorenç (a municipality located in the Llevant region of Mallorca). It was a very short lag-time response due to the geomorphology and vegetation cover of the basin. Further, the location of the town in the flooding area, the concrete channelization of the stream, and the presence of various bridges contributed to this flash flood. This event led to devastating consequences: 13 people died, along with damage to more than 300 dwellings, 30 stores, and 324 vehicles (Lorenzo-Lacruz et al. 2019). Since 1960, 25 people have lost their lives in Mallorca island due to flood events (Grimalt-Gelabert et al. 2020); this recent event is of great importance since it contributed to more than half the fatalities in the last 60 years.

We should highlight that the floodplain where Sant Llorenç town is located was classified as a potential flood prone area (ES110_ARPSI_01581) according to the European Union Flood Directive. Therefore, all the information related to flood risk, including surface extent, was available in both national and regional flooding viewers. The current flood risk management plan of the river basin district of the Balearic Islands (2016–2021) includes a management measures program, which focuses on river restoration (e.g. enhancing natural water retention, reforestation of stream banks), but none of these actions were carried out before the catastrophic flood.

Immediately after the flood, the regional government launched a series of urgent measures that included clearing the main channels (i.e. removing wood and debris) and repairing bridge pillars and the fords that cross the non-perennial stream. Currently, the river basin district of the Balearic Islands is reviewing and updating the flood risk hazard maps. Current discussions revolve around applying transversal artificial retention measures and diverting the main channel towards the floodplain upstream of Sant Llorenç town. It should be noted that upstream of the concrete channel that crosses the urban area, the non-perennial stream presents an artificial small channel with two stone walls. Recently, the new management plan of the river basin district (2022–2027) planned the implementation of Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) on the floodplain and, more important, at the basin scale. The inefficiency of a concrete channel was demonstrated by the extreme flood event in 2018. Thus, it is obvious that to conserve the non-perennial stream and its natural drought-flood cycles and to enhance people’s resilience to flood risk, the non-perennial stream must recover its channel and the associated floodplain. The government is also working on a flood warning system, although the short lag-time response in this small basin reaffirms the importance of education about non-perennial streams and flood risk.

2.2. Data mining

Content analysis was used to analyse news reports related to streams. The most read and widespread online newspaper in the Balearic Islands, Ultima Hora, was chosen for this study. Specifically, more than 61.2% of Balearic Islands online newspapers readers read this newspaper (AIMC 2021). It has about 143.000 readers, according to the latest General Media Study, and daily circulation of 23,158 print copies (AIMC 2021; OJD 2021). The most read generalist online newspaper was chosen because it is the media that can reach the larger population on the region, while we acknowledge that other media (e.g. printed newspapers, radio, television, social media) may better reach specific society sectors.

We performed the news reports search using the search engine of the Ultima Hora online newspaper, from 1 October 2017 to 31 October 2019 (i.e. 25 months). This time range was chosen to cover a one-year period before and after the flash flood event of 9 October 2018. We could then assess whether that flash flood event had an impact on the media coverage of non-perennial streams in the region. The term ‘torrent’ was used in the search to retrieve all news reports including the words ‘torrente’ and ‘torrent’, the local term for stream in Spanish and Catalan languages, respectively, and ‘torrentada’, the local term for a flood event, as well as their plurals in both languages – ‘torrentes’, ‘torrents’, ‘torrentadas’, and ‘torrentades’.

2.3. Content analysis

A total of 648 news reports were retrieved. All news reports were screened, and those not related to non-perennial streams were eliminated (n = 201). For instance, there was a large number of news reports retrieved because they included the term ‘torrent’, but the term referred to the family name Torrent, which is common in the Catalan language. The remaining 447 news reports were carefully read, and their content was analysed to identify which topics and subtopics related to non-perennial streams were covered by the news reports. As a result, a presence-absence (1–0) database was generated, with news reports as rows and topics and subtopics as columns, where presence (1) meant the topic/subtopic was covered by the specific news report, and absence (0) meant the topic/subtopic was not covered. Once the database was generated, those news reports that only mentioned a non-perennial stream of the Balearic Islands as a geographical reference and, therefore, had content that was not related to non-perennial streams, were excluded. This process led to a final database of 407 news reports, which were included in the analysis (Figure 2).

Figure 2. PRISMA flow diagram depicting the different phases for the news reports review.

Topics and subtopics were defined in a back-forward process after screening all news reports and starting the analysis. For instance, we detected that some news reports focused on the public budget spent by the local, regional or national government on non-perennial streams and that these budgets could be directly invested in the non-perennial stream (e.g. restoration, stream clearing, flood risk mitigation) or indirectly (e.g. bridge restoration). Finally, seven main topics focused on non-perennial streams were defined and included in the dataset, most of them divided into several subtopics: (i) floods (which included five subtopics – flood risk and the projection and prediction of future flood events, past flood events, human losses related to floods, economic and material losses due to flood events, and the role of floods in river ecosystems and their biodiversity) (ii) ecological aspects of non-perennial streams (iii) non-perennial stream uses (water use and recreational use) (iv) water quality (waste water treatment plants, industrial sewage) (v) other impacts and actions (solid waste, channelization, stream clearing, restoration/renaturation) (vi) budgets (direct and indirect budgets), and (vii) the relationship between non-perennial streams and other related systems (i.e. coastal areas, wetlands, reservoirs, groundwater, springs) (Table 1). Moreover, the global message of the news reports was also noted, differentiating among those news reports in which the global message was that non-perennial streams were risk areas, sewers, or a source of freshwater.

Table 1. Proportion of news reports related to streams that covered each topic and subtopic (n = 407; from 1 October 2017 to 31 October 2019).

Topic	Subtopic	% news reports
Floods	Floods (all)	64.68
	Past Floods	59.20
	Material Losses	33.33
	Human Losses	24.38
	Future Floods	11.69
	Ecological implications	1.99
Ecology	Stream ecology (all)	6.97
Stream uses	Water use	2.70
	Recreational use	7.21
Water quality	Water quality (all)	9.20
	WWTP	8.71
	Industrial sewage	1.74
Other impacts and actions	Solid waste	11.19
	Channelization	3.23
	Stream clearing	4.73
	Restoration/Renaturation	6.47
Budgets	Direct	7.71
	Indirect	14.93
Related systems	Coastal areas	20.90
	Wetland (Albufera)	2.24
	Reservoirs	1.49
	Groundwater	0.50
	Springs	0.25
Global message	Streams as risk areas	63.18
	Streams as sewers	13.18
	Streams as water sources	0.20

For the spatial analysis, each news report was classified territorially into one of the following twelve spatial categories: the six regions in which Mallorca island is divided, for news reports focusing on one of its regions (i.e. Tramuntana, Palma, Raiguer, Pla de Mallorca, Migjorn, and Llevant); Mallorca island, for news reports referring to the whole island or to more than one Mallorca region; Menorca island; Pitiusas islands (i.e. Ibiza and Formentera islands); Balearic Islands, for news reports referring to more than one Balearic Island or to the whole Balearic Islands region; ‘non-Balearic’, for news reports about other Spanish or foreign areas; and ‘other’, for those news reports that did not fit in any of the previous eleven categories because they referred to more than one.

2.4. Data analysis

We performed frequency analysis on the topics and subtopics covered by the news reports. In order to explore whether the catastrophic flood influenced mass media coverage of non-perennial streams over time, we visually analyzed the temporal distribution of the most frequently covered themes, grouping news reports by month. Then, a Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was performed to achieve a better understanding about the relationship between the different topics/subtopics covered by the news reports, using the vegan package in R statistical software version 4.0.5 (R Core Team 2020). All 407 news reports were plotted on the first two PCA axes, and the correlation between the first two PCA axes and the covered topics by news reports was analyzed. Finally, the spatial distribution of the news reports and their covered topics was analyzed to check for territorial inequalities in media coverage and possible spatial relationships between territories and topics.

3. Results

3.1. General content analysis

The frequency analysis showed that the most recurring topic covered by the news reports was floods (n = 260) and that the global message of most news reports was that non-perennial streams are risk areas for humans (n = 255) (Table 1). Among the news reports that referred to floods (n = 260), 91.5% covered past floods, 37.7% mentioned casualties, and 51.5% mentioned material damages. In contrast, only 18.1% included information on future flood risks and just 3.1% included information on the role of these floods in the environment (e.g. ecosystems, wild animals, plants). Apart from these most recurring topics, the high proportion of news reports about the relationship between non-perennial streams and coastal areas (20.9%) stands out. In addition, the amount of news reports related to pollution is remarkable: 13.9% of the news reports depicted non-perennial streams as sewers that contain waste, 11.2% were related to solid waste, and 9.2% covered water quality issues. In contrast, only 7% of news reports addressed aspects of ecology, and only 6.5% covered positive actions such as non-perennial stream restoration/renaturation. Among the news reports that referred to budgets (n = 91), 14.9% mentioned budgets indirectly related to non-perennial streams, in which non-perennial streams were not the main objective of the budget (e.g. bridge restoration), while 7.7% of the news reports mentioned budgets invested directly in non-perennial streams (e.g. restoration, stream clearing, solid waste removal). Finally, news reports rarely depicted non-perennial streams as a source of freshwater (0.2%) and rarely covered the relationship of non-perennial streams with groundwater (0.5%) and natural springs (0.2%) (Table 1).

The Principal Component Analysis (PCA) on the news reports condensed 49% of the information into the first two axes (Figure 3). The PCA first axis identified a dominant gradient defined by the coverage of floods (factor loading on PCA first axis: 0.47), and the depiction of non-perennial streams as risk areas for humans (0.47), as well as by related subtopics such as effects of past floods (0.49), material losses caused by floods (0.34), and human losses caused by floods (0.25). News reports tended to split along the PCA first axis: those news reports published before the Sant Llorenç flood distributed on the negative end of the PCA first axis, while those published after the flood event distributed on the positive end. The PCA associated news reports published after the flood event with those covering flood topics, in contrast with news reports published before that event. The PCA second axis was defined by those news reports related to non-perennial streams and coastal areas (factor loading on PCA second axis: 0.61), as well as by the news reports about water quality (0.35), sewage discharge from wastewater treatment plants (0.34), and those generally depicting non-perennial streams as sewers (0.39).

Figure 3. Ordination diagram of the Principal Component analysis (PCA) of topics and subtopics covered by news reports. Each dot represents a news report: orange dots represent news reports dated before the Sant Llorenç flood (i.e. from 1 October 2017 to 9 October 2018) and blue dots represent news reports dated after the Sant Llorenç flood (i.e. from 10 October 2018 to 31 October 2019). Confidence ellipses of 95% were used. Arrows for each topic/subtopic show the magnitude and the direction of increasing values of that variable. Topics/subtopics with a factor loading >0.25 are shown.

3.2. Temporal analysis

The analysis of the time distributions of the news reports showed a clear pattern related to the catastrophic flood and its one-year anniversary (Figure 4(a)). Of all news reports related to non-perennial streams published during the 25-month study period, about one third (33.3%, 134 news reports) were published in October 2018, when the aforementioned catastrophic flood in Sant Llorenç occurred. In contrast, a low number of news reports related to non-perennial streams were published during the 12 months before the flood event (3–13 per month; 18.7% of all news reports related to non-perennial streams published during the 25-month period). The other 49% was published during the 12 months after the Sant Llorenç flood. During the months after the flood event, the number of news reports related to non-perennial streams started to decrease but increased again in October 2019, coinciding with the one-year anniversary of the flood event. It is worth noting that, of the 134 news reports during October 2018, when the flood event occurred, only 16 (11.9% of the news reports published that month) mentioned future flood risks, just three (2.2%) dealt with concrete channelization and related issues, and three covered the role of floods on ecosystems and their biodiversity.

Figure 4. Temporal distribution of news reports and the covered topics. (a) all news reports (b) news reports about floods (c) news reports in which the global message is that streams are risk areas for humans (d) news reports about stream channelization, cemented streams, and related grey infrastructure.

Regarding the temporal analysis of the different topics covered by the news reports, those dealing with floods (n = 260; Figure 4(b)) and those depicting non-perennial streams as hazards to humans (n = 255; Figure 4(c)) showed a temporal pattern that was similar to the general pattern of the totality of news reports related to streams. In contrast, news report coverage of other topics such as ecology (n = 28) or discharge from wastewater treatment plants (n = 35) did not show this temporal distribution. For instance, the number of news reports mentioning non-perennial stream channelization decreased over time (n = 13; Figure 4(d)).

3.3. Spatial analysis

Territorial analysis of the news reports showed that the vast majority of them were about non-perennial streams located in Mallorca or its regions (n = 383; 94.1%), while just a few news reports covered territories other than Mallorca (n = 24). Almost half of the news reports (n = 183; 45.0%) focused on the Llevant region of Mallorca (Figure 5(a)), where the Sant Llorenç flood occurred. This general result was more evident when analysing the news reports about floods (Figure 5(b)) and those that depicted non-perennial streams as risk areas (Figure 5(c)), in which the Llevant region accounted for 68.1% and 67.5%, respectively.

Figure 5. Spatial distribution of news reports and the covered topics. (a) all news reports (b) news reports about floods (c) news reports that depict streams as risk areas (d) news reports about wastewater treatment plants (e) news reports about stream ecology (f) news reports about recreational uses.

In contrast, most news reports about sewage discharge from wastewater treatment plants referred to Palma (the Mallorca region where the main city is located), exactly 27 from a total of 35 (Figure 5(d)). A similar spatial distribution was observed for news reports that depicted non-perennial streams as sewers (n = 53). However, there were more news reports about solid waste (n = 45) focused on Llevant (19 news reports) than in Palma (13 news reports). Regarding news reports that covered ecology topics, they were evenly distributed among the Mallorca regions (Figure 5(e)), but none of them referred to non-perennial streams outside Mallorca island. Most news reports about recreational uses (24 of 29) focused on the non-perennial streams located in the Tramuntana region of Mallorca (Figure 5(f)).

4. Discussion

4.1. Non-perennial streams and flood risk

The results revealed that floods were the most common topic covered by news reports about non-perennial streams during the 25-month period analysed. This can be explained by the great influence of the catastrophic flood in Sant Llorenç in October 2018, as reflected in both the temporal pattern and the spatial distribution of news reports. About a third of news reports were published the month of the catastrophic flood, and almost half of news reports were related to the region where the catastrophic flood occurred. Notably, previous research in this field (Kasperson et al. 1988) found that mass media is a potential source of social amplification of extreme events and it also influences the flow of information. Our study builds on these previous findings by showing a clear increase in the media coverage of non-perennial streams during the month of the flood event. This news report increase disappeared two months after the flood and did not appear again until the one-year anniversary of the aforementioned event. These results support the idea that mass media has great power in generating collective memory, which plays a controlling role in social awareness of flood risks by learning from past disasters (Blöschl et al. 2017; Best 2019; Song et al. 2021).

Despite the large number of news reports about floods, they rarely covered the potential causes of flood damages, (e.g. the presence of grey infrastructure within river channels, or the high degree of urbanization of its floodplain). In the specific case of the Sant Llorenç flood, the location of the town in the floodplain, the artificial channelization of the non-perennial stream, the presence of low-span bridges that caused heavy backwater effects, a delayed red alert warning, and the unawareness of citizens were contributing factors to the catastrophic consequences of the flood (Lorenzo-Lacruz et al. 2019). The lack of news reports regarding the causes of the flood impacts can lead to fear and a negative and incorrect view of non-perennial streams. In fact, our results showed how more than half the news reports depicted non-perennial stream ecosystems as risk areas for humans. Similar results are found in the literature for other environmental topics. For instance, Ford and King (2015) concluded that news reports about climate change primarily focus on stating the need to adapt rather than documenting the actual preparations that are being made for adaptation. Similarly, media coverage of predator attacks seemingly do not provide insights into the causes of these incidents and possible remedies, which may provoke fear and a negative view of predators (Bombieri et al. 2018).

It is worth noting that floods are a natural phenomenon to which biodiversity is adapted, thus floods are necessary for maintaining river ecosystems, especially in the Mediterranean region where streams are characterized by flood and drought cycles (Junk et al. 1989; Poff et al. 1997). Human settlements are commonly located next to streams (Fang et al. 2018), so human exposure to flood risk is partly due to settlement patterns in floodplains for the countervailing benefits they offer, as is the case of the Sant Llorenç flood. The low mass media coverage of causes of the flood contributes to building an erroneous flood risk perception that may dampen the implementation of sustainable flood risk management measures (Glaus et al. 2020). Traditional flood risk management has focused on hard engineering methods, known as grey infrastructure (e.g. dikes, grade control structures, straightening, catch basins, and pipes) (Pagano et al. 2019) that threaten the ecological and social values of freshwater ecosystems (Kirchherr et al. 2016; Belletti et al. 2020; Maavara et al. 2020). Alternatively, sustainable flood management practices, such as Nature-Based Solutions (NBS), have been proposed to overcome the conflicts between flood risk management and river conservation that characterize grey infrastructure. However, the replacement of grey infrastructure with sustainable flood management practices can be perceived as an increase of risk, due to lack of awareness about their benefits (Bustillos Ardaya et al. 2017; Han and Kuhlicke 2019). Therefore, a lack of mass media coverage of flood causes may hinder the implementation of sustainable flood management practices that would reduce negative impacts of the flood, while providing benefits for ecosystems and people (Nesshöver et al. 2017; UNESCO 2018; Alves et al. 2020).

4.2. Non-perennial stream pollution and their relationship with coastal areas

Our study also detected a large number of news reports about non-perennial streams and coastal areas that were also related to water quality, wastewater treatment plants, and solid waste. Most of these news reports alerted people about beaches that were closed to the public due to water quality issues, which were caused by the discharge of non-perennial streams on those beaches. Wastewater treatment plants discharging their effluents to non-perennial streams and the presence of solid waste in them affected the beaches frequented by tourists, also damaging the economy of the region.

The Balearic Islands are a well-known tourist destination, with a strong seasonal concentration of visitors during the summer due to its climate, beach recreation being the main attraction (IBESTAT 2020a). Tourism is the main economic activity in the Balearic Islands, which received a total of 13.6 million tourists in 2019 (INE 2019). In 2020, a total of 18.590 companies in the tourism sector were active (IBESTAT 2020b). In fact, the tourist occupation exceeds between one and three times the carrying capacity set out by the Balearic environmental agency (Bujosa et al. 2015). Therefore, these news reports focused on how coastal areas are negatively impacted by the non-perennial streams flowing into them due to wastewater and solid waste, contributing to the social misconception of non-perennial streams.

4.3. Missing the point: the ecological and social value of non-perennial streams

It is worth noting that news reports rarely covered water uses and did not depict non-perennial streams as a source of freshwater for consumption. In contrast, Weber et al. (2017) found water consumptive uses to be the most common topic covered by journal and blog articles about streams (not focused on non-perennial streams). Our findings can be partly explained due to our focus on non-perennial streams and because surface water is an uncommon water source in the Balearic Islands, where groundwater is the main water resource (68% of the total water resource used in the Balearic Islands) (García and Rodríguez-Lozano 2020). However, the vertical hydraulic connectivity between non-perennial streams and aquifers plays a key role in water resources availability (Allen et al. 2020). Groundwater can contribute to surface flow, being responsible for the permanent presence of surface water in some reaches of non-perennial streams (Jourde et al. 2007; Hughes et al. 2012). Moreover, streambed infiltration during periodic flow can serve as the primary source of aquifer recharge in non-perennial streams (Shentsis and Rosenthal 2003; Subyani 2004; Shanafield et al. 2021). In fact, groundwater recharge has been highlighted as a key ecosystem service provided by non-perennial streams, being of vital importance for water resources availability in Mediterranean, semi-arid and arid regions (Nicolás-Ruiz et al. 2021).

In this vein, we also detected a general absence of news reports about non-perennial stream ecology, with no special coverage of the natural protected areas of the Tramuntana region (Parc Natural de la Serra de Tramuntana) and Menorca Island (UNESCO Biosphere Reserve). In fact, no news reports were found about the ecology of the non-perennial streams of the Menorca Biosphere Reserve. This may be partially explained by the influence of the extreme flood event on the media coverage of non-perennial streams, that this study evidenced. However, even within the flood topic, only a few news reports covered the environmental implications of floods. In the case of the Balearic Islands, non-perennial streams are inhabited by complex biological communities containing a large number of endemic species (Pardo and Zwick 1993; Álvarez and Pardo 2007; Rodríguez-Lozano et al. 2023), which are threatened by flow change, nutrient/organic pollution and other human impacts (Delgado et al. 2012; García et al. 2017). Despite our deepening knowledge of non-perennial streams, they are still poorly recognized, and people still perceive them as less valuable and less worthy of conservation than perennial streams (Rodríguez-Lozano et al. 2020). The low social valuation of non-perennial streams and the recent attention on them may explain the low coverage of their ecological aspects. This leads to the conclusion that mass media is missing an opportunity to educate people on these ecosystems, in order to change the current misconception the general public has about them.

People’s knowledge regarding the ecological and social values of non-perennial streams is necessary for the development of positive environmental attitudes and behaviors towards these ecosystems (Bamberg and Möser 2007; Barata et al. 2017). These have key implications for sustainable flood management practices (Ladrera et al. 2020), because the social feasibility of sustainable flood management practices, such as NBS, requires that local communities understand rivers as complex ecosystems (Thorne et al. 2018; Martinez-Juarez et al. 2019). The reduced mass media coverage of the ecological and social values of non-perennial streams, together with the lack of news reports explaining flood causes, can lead to a misinformed population on these topics, hampering the conservation of these ecosystems. Because of the great influence mass media has on public opinion, a great opportunity to use mass media to educate society and stakeholders on these issues is missed.

5. Conclusions

In this paper, we aimed to explore how non-perennial streams are covered by mass media, which can shape opinions and attitudes of the public. The analysis showed that the most recurring topic was floods, without focusing on their causes, a third of the news reports were published in the month of the catastrophic flood, and almost half of the news reports focused on the region where the flood occurred. Our findings evidence the strong influence an extreme flood event has on media coverage of non-perennial streams, affecting not only the topics covered but also the temporal and spatial coverage of the media. A positive take of these results is that mass media is contributing to generation of a collective memory on social awareness of flood risks. On the contrary, important topics such as ecological aspects of non-perennial streams or the relevance of non-perennial streams as a source of water consumption were not in the spotlight. Thus, news reports do not contribute to changing social knowledge and awareness about non-perennial streams in the Balearic Islands.

Fluid communication between researchers and communicators is essential in order to educate the general society and stakeholders about non-perennial streams, which would facilitate the implementation of public policies based on scientific results (Martinez-Juarez et al. 2019). Because risk management is conditioned by public perception, the power of mass media should be harnessed to educate people regarding the ecological values of non-perennial streams and sustainable flood management. While this study focuses on digital mass media, specifically on a generalist online newspaper, different media may be used to better reach specific society sectors, including printed newspapers, radio, television, and social media. In this vein, education and connection to nature have been highlighted as key factors shaping social perceptions towards non-perennial streams (Rodríguez-Lozano et al. 2020), suggesting that educational efforts beyond mass media communication, as well as initiatives to increase people’s connection to nature (e.g. hiking, birdwatching, improving accessibility to local streams) may also contribute to improving perceptions and attitudes towards non-perennial streams. More studies focusing on the human dimensions of non-perennial streams are needed to understand the complexity of factors that influence the current negative perceptions towards these ecosystems.

Acknowledgments

We thank the Editor and the two reviewers for their help to improve this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

PR-L was supported by the Government of the Balearic Islands and the European Social Fund through a Margalida Comas postdoctoral contract [PD/031/2018] and by MCIN/AEI through the Juan de la Cierva - Incorporacion program [IJC2019-041601-I].