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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Ecol. Evol.

Sec. Urban Ecology

Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fevo.2025.1615395

The rhythms of citizens' leisure and recreation: A case study based on social media data

Provisionally accepted
  • 1Electronic Science Research Institute of China Electronics Technology Group Corporation, Beijing, China
  • 2National Engineering Laboratory for Public Security Risk Perception and Control by Big Data, Beijing, China
  • 3School of Management, Tianjin University of Technology, Tianjin, China
  • 4Teachers' College of Beijing Union University, Beijing, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

Leisure and recreation behavior has become one of the important lifestyles for urban residents, according to the continuous development of China's social economy and the improvement of urban residents' living standards and the spatio-temporal rhythm of these activities presents significant potential for exploration. This study investigates the temporal and spatial patterns of citizens' leisure and recreation activities in Beijing with the social media data from Sina Weibo. Through machine learning and spatial statistical methods, the research analyzes residents' leisure and recreation behaviors, identifying four main topics: "Popular Nowadays," "Special Events," "Scenic Spots," and "Daily Leisure." The analysis reveals the leisure and recreation activity timing correlates closely with daily work and rest habits, which shows significant differences between weekdays and weekends. The "Popular Nowadays" accounts for 21.9% of leisure and recreation activities, while the "Daily Leisure" represents the largest proportion at 29.1% and shows a marked increase on weekends. Spatially, leisure and recreation activities display a centripetal distribution, with the high activity levels of the city center and main roads,and different leisure and recreation topics have distinct hotpots, including commercial areas, scenic spots, and cultural sites. Notably, the "Special Events" demonstrates a significant increase in activity distance on Saturdays, with an average distance considerably higher than other topics. The study concludes that the dynamic level of leisure and recreation activities is influenced by urban facility distribution and quality, which offer valuable insights for urban planning and "leisure and recreation "space improvement in Beijing.

Keywords: urban leisure and recreation activities, social media Weibo data, Tourism big data, machine learning, urban rhythm, Beijing

Received: 21 Apr 2025; Accepted: 03 Oct 2025.

Copyright: © 2025 Wang, Zhi, Zhou and Cui. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

* Correspondence: Na Cui, cuina0203@163.com

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