Accidents and Accountability: Perceptions of Unintentional Injury in Three National Parks

Perception of Risk and the Attribution of Responsibility for Accidents

“…Variations in risk perceptions among visitors also pose implications for managing parks and communicating about risk. Personal tolerance for “desirable” risk as well as perceived ability to control one's exposure to “undesirable risk” is a product, at least in part, of one's experience in national parks, as well as preferred recreational activities; indeed, correlational data in this and a related study substantiate these relationships . For instance, the degree of comfort in, and valuation of, undeveloped wilderness areas is unlikely to be universal among all visitors.…”

“…Knowing how park visitors attribute responsibility for the cause of park accidents can inform future studies that aim to influence public support for various risk management strategies in national parks and other public recreational contexts, such as city and state parks. In such places, messages might be constructed such that visitors are more likely to think about responsibility for their own safety in institutionally supported ways—that is, in the case of the NPS, to envision responsibility for ensuring safety as “shared” between visitors and park employees . Within the context of public health, researchers have begun to apply various strategies, including framing, narrative, and visual images, to influence perceptions of obesity as a condition caused not just by personal decisions (e.g., caloric intake), but also by social determinants (e.g., affordability of healthy food) .…”

“…Salience of the hypothetical visitor accident was measured by asking respondents whether or not a similar incident had happened to them or a person they knew. For the purposes of this research, individuals who responded that they were “unsure” whether they, or a close other, had lived through a similar experience were excluded . Therefore, salience was measured dichotomously (i.e., had/had not experienced a similar incident first‐ or second‐hand).…”

“…When considered with other variables, such as sociodemographics, attributing responsibility to the child emerged as the most important predictor of elevated parental risk perceptions. Other studies have investigated the extent to which experience and cultural beliefs predict risk perceptions and causal attributions, but do not establish a clear relationship between the latter two variables. Thus, more research is needed to clarify how (or whether) an individual's perception of risk (to self or others) might influence how he or she attributes the cause of accidents.…”

Walking Off-Trail in National Parks: Monkey See Monkey Do

“…The role of social pressure from other people important to the visitors could support their judgment to engage in off-trail walking. Although, the action of off-trail walking is dangerous, if visitors see others venturing off-trail, this might significantly influence visitors' intentions to non-comply (Goh et al, 2017;Rickard & Newman, 2014). In addition, not all non-compliant behaviors are volitional and could be triggered by external factors such as perceived overcrowding (Sim et al, 2018), lack of signage (Bradford & McIntyre, 2007) or misinterpretation of signage (Sever & Verbic, 2018).…”