Wilderness is an important Issue in British Columbia. The government of
British Columbia deemed it necessary to establish a Wilderness Advisory
Committee in 1985 to review and report on the place of wilderness in society in
the province. Recently, the media have highlighted the controversy and
confrontation over several areas in British Columbia on the issue of
preservation versus development. This issue continues to stimulate public
debate.
This study surveys four groups of subjects in British Columbia in order to
assess and compare their wilderness psychological dimensions. These four
groups, chosen for their hypothesized range of wilderness viewpoints, are
members of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS), wilderness
users, wilderness managers, and members of the general public. The
methodological tool used in this research was a mall survey sent or distributed
to these four groups of subjects.
The wilderness psychological dimensions of these groups were divided into
three categories: the personal, the societal, and the environmental. The
personal psychological dimension is the individual's perceived locus of control
with respect to wilderness which was assessed by an Internal-External
Wilderness Scale. The societal psychological dimension is the individual's
perceptions, attitudes, values, and beliefs with respect to whether humans
should control nature and wilderness. This dimension was assessed by a
Wilderness Environmental Protection Scale. The environmental concern
dimension was assessed by a Conservation Scale which contains statements
on pollution and natural resources, two key indicators of environmental concern.
In addition to the above assessments, the associations between the
psychological dimensions and other subject variables categorized as
wilderness views and use, socioeconomic characteristics, and wilderness
managers’ positions and opinions were also investigated.
The results of these studies indicate statistically significant differences
among the four study groups on each of the three psychological scales. In
terms of paired group differences on the Internal-External Wilderness Scale,
four pairs of study groups were significantly different. The four paired groups
were: wilderness users and members of the general public, members of the
general public and CPAWS members, members of the general public and
wilderness managers, and CPAWS members and wilderness managers. All
pairs of study groups were significantly different on the Wilderness
Environmental Protection Scale and the Conservation Scale, with the exception
of the study group pair of members of the general public and wilderness
managers on the Conservation Scale. Certain wilderness views and use
variables (a need for more designated wilderness areas, being a member of a
recreation organization, and total number of memberships in recreation
organizations), socioeconomic characteristics variables (education level, age,
and employment status), and wilderness managers' positions and opinions
variables (inadequacy of current wilderness legislation, income, and training)
showed statistically significant relationships to the psychological dimensions.
On the basis of the results of this research, a conceptual and theoretical
framework for the psychological dimensions of wilderness was developed. The
Wilderness Environmental Protection Scale and the Conservation Scale can be
conceptualized as measuring a care dimension with respect to wilderness,
while the Internal-External Wilderness Scale can be conceptualized as
measuring a control dimension with respect to wilderness. Within this
framework, all four study groups can be classified as having both a high control
and a high care view of wilderness. A Wilderness Paradigm is presented which
treats the psychological interpretation of wilderness as a function of these two
dimensions, A strong endorsement of this Wilderness Paradigm indicates a
deep respect for and positive valuing of wilderness. The better understanding
of the psychological dimensions of wilderness provided by this research could
help to resolve some of the conflicts over wilderness in British Columbia. / Graduate
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:uvic.ca/oai:dspace.library.uvic.ca:1828/9483 |
| Date | 20 June 2018 |
| Creators | Burr, Kevin F. |
| Contributors | Dearden, Philip |
| Source Sets | University of Victoria |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | Available to the World Wide Web |
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