THE ROLE OF ALTERNATIVE MEDIA IN DEVELOPING YOUTH CONCEPTS AND ATTITUDES TOWARDS ECOTOURISM IN EGYPT

Abstract

This study drives at developing youth perceptions and attitudes towards recognizing to the ecotourism in Egypt. The study problem is crystallized in the following question: To what extent can alternative media contribute to developing youth concepts and attitudes towards ecotourism? The study belongs to the experimental types of studies, relying on one-group design and the pre/post measurement and using tools represented in (the Test of Concepts – Scale of Attitudes). The study sample consists of (100) university youth from Ain Shams University. The most prominent results are: the high level of follow-up of respondents to the page (Ecotourism in Egypt) on Facebook, and the reason for this can be attributed to the fact that the page provides a tremendous amount of information about ecotourism in Egypt, its resources and reinforcing youth positive attitudes towards the environment. Added to that, the diversity in presenting information through pictures, videos, comics and various comments on environmental events towards the environment. There is a statistically significant correlation between the degree of respondents’ use of the page (Ecotourism in Egypt) on Facebook and their attitudes towards the environmental issues. There is a statistically significant correlation between the degree of the respondents’ dependence on the (Ecotourism in Egypt) page on the facebook and their knowledge and awareness of the information concerning these addressed environmental issues. The study recommends the protection of natural reserves and places that represent ecotourism and represent about 20% of Egypt's area and embodied in (30) announced formally natural reserves and (14) unannounced informally natural reserves called the future natural reserves. There are also other places represent also the ecotourism in Egypt such as (safari tourism, deserts, green tourism, diving tourism, mountain climbing, medical tourism, antiquities and inscriptions tourism, hospitalization tourism). Everyone should preserve the environment, even through simple actions such as preventing throwing waste and paper into natural reserves, writing on the walls of temples and monuments, and dumping waste in the Nile and rare natural lakes.