In search of situational effects in outdoor recreation: Different methods, different results

Relationships between outdoor recreation situations and experiences have been the of widespread research interest. Although scores of studies are directed at understanding linkages between various situational conditions and satisfaction, crowding, various experiences, empirical evidence has not been highly supportive of consistent relationships across studies. The lack of persuasive evidence regarding situational may be an artifact of the traditional research design associated with outdoor research. Specifically, the posttrip mailback questionnaire is limited in its to assess situational effects because of (a) reliance on long-term memory, (b) use of global measures, and (c) inability to distinguish situational from differences. Within the empirical portion of this article, analyses using time of encounters and perceived crowding illustrate contrasting results between a questionnaire and a diary-like method from a sample of overnight backcountry users at Grand Canyon National Park. Results of the mailback questionnaire are with past studies of the same variables in that less than 10% of the variance crowding was explained. Using the same sample, results of a multilevel analysis associated with a diary-like method indicated that 84% of study participants exhibited positive relationships between perceived crowding and time length of encounters. The concluding discussion argues that the search for situational effects could assisted by use of diary-like methods.