Benefits of public land usage: an analysis of outdoor recreationists

Abstract

Benefits-based management (BBM) is a prominent framework for managing outdoor recreation on public lands. BBM provides public land managers a framework to both identify and facilitate established recreation benefits for visitors to their lands. Despite its wide adoption among public land agencies, BBM has been criticized for being too complex and difficult to implement because of its broad theoretical construction and all-inclusive definition of benefits. To overcome these problems – using a national (the USA) sample – we identify: (1) the benefits that are most salient among outdoor recreationists and (2) six distinct groupings of public lands outdoor recreationists united by their desired benefits, relevant behaviors, values, and demographics. These findings open BBM to a more general application and understanding of outdoor recreationists.

Keywords:

• outdoor recreation
• benefits-based management
• USA