Tourism gaze profoundly influences the perception of ancient town landscapes by both tourists and residents. Taking the photos and reviews of Qikou Ancient Town posted by tourists on Dianping website as data sources, combined with content analysis and social network analysis methods, NVivo11.0 and Gephi software was employed to investigate the perceptual characteristics of Qikou Ancient Town’s cultural landscapes from the perspective of tourism gaze. The results reveal that tourists primarily focus on cultural landscape elements such as the ancient town’s rivers, streets and traditional dwellings which perceive material cultural landscapes significantly more than non-material cultural landscapes. In terms of landscape combination perception, tourists have the highest perception of the combination of natural and material cultural landscapes, while their perception of non-material cultural landscape combinations is relatively low. Under the gaze of tourism, the perceptual interaction pattern between tourists and the ancient town landscape exhibits a deep integration of selectivity and interactivity. Moreover, residents’ perception of Qikou Ancient Town’s cultural landscapes has undergone significant changes, including a re-recognition of the value of the ancient town’s cultural landscapes and selective changes in cultural landscape perception based on tourist interest and economic value. In light of this, the study recommends balancing the display of material and non-material cultural heritage, enhancing the quality of the ancient town landscape, and promoting harmonious integration of the ancient town landscape to enhance the perceived experience and satisfaction of tourists and residents.

tourist gaze  /  Qikou Ancient Town  /  cultural landscape  /  landscape perception