This study of wilderness areas in Scotland traces the changing concept of wilderness as it has evolved in response to the particular conditions of Scotland's physical geography and land use history; it describes, and broadly delimits, the land area which might at present be defined as wilderness; and it analyses the process by which this land has come to be recognised as the resource for a distinctive form of recreation. On the basis of data obtained from a large-scale questionnaire survey, the physical and perceptual attributes of this recreational use are discussed in detail, moving from the social characteristics and activity patterns of visitors to their motivations and their attitudes to wilderness areas and their qualities. As comparative background the discussion of the wilderness concept is set first against the context of evolving attitudes in Western Europe up to the Romantic Revolution of the eighteenth century; second, against the experience of the United States of America, where wilderness has attained its highest level of expression as a concept, and its greatest extent and importance as a form of land use for conservation and recreation; and third, against a brief review of the current status of wild land throughout the modern world. The study's main conclusion is that despite the widespread modification of its character by man, the Scottish wilderness retains some of the physical, and many of the perceptual, attributes and recreational values of absolute wilderness, and that these explain the high level of commitment of recreational users of the land. Some suggestions are offered for an approach to management, and for further research, which may promote the conservation of these values.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:447113 |
| Date | January 1977 |
| Creators | Aitken, Robert |
| Publisher | University of Aberdeen |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Source | http://digitool.abdn.ac.uk:80/webclient/DeliveryManager?pid=185681 |
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