Place meanings and critical issues in Grand Teton National Park

Abstract

This paper seeks to contribute to a better understanding of the potential to use place attachment and meanings as a natural resource management tool. A mail-back survey was distributed to Grand Teton National Park (GTNP) visitors to collect opinions regarding "critical issues," as well as perceived meanings of special places in the park. The central research questions were: 1) Do visitors who are affected negatively or positively by the critical issues differ in regard to whether they reported a special place in GTNP?; and 2) Among visitors reporting a special place in GTNP, do the reasons for their attachments (meanings) differ between the positive, negative, and neutral impact groups? Results indicated that GTNP is a place that holds a multitude of meanings for visitors. In addition, visitors who reported a special place in GTNP were more likely to indicate an impact due to the critical issues than visitors who did not report a special place. Finally, with regard to critical issue impact, few significant differences were noted between impact groups.

Parent Publication

• Proceedings of the 2007 northeastern recreation research symposium

Citation

Smaldone, Dave. 2008. Place meanings and critical issues in Grand Teton National Park. In: LeBlanc, Cherie; Vogt, Christine, comps. Proceedings of the 2007 northeastern recreation research symposium; 2007 April 15-17; Bolton Landing, NY. Gen. Tech. Rep. NRS-P-23. Newtown Square, PA: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Northern Research Station: 60-68.