Anza Borrego Desert State Park - California State Parks - State of ...

Final Report – October 2001
What Experiences do Visitors Seek in a Trip to Anza-
Borrego?
Anza Borrego Values and Visitor Motivation
Exploring the values visitors place on Anza-Borrego Desert State Park and identifying
the reasons visitors come to the Park are ways that managers can better provide
opportunities for quality experiences to a diverse group of visitors. In this section we
describe how we measured the values visitors place on ABDSP, and the reasons visitors
come to ABDSP. We provide tables of descriptive statistics that demonstrate the overall
ratings of the items we asked respondents to consider.
Measurement of the Values Visitors Place on Anza Borrego
Visitors place a wide variety of values on Anza-Borrego. Many have different opinions
about the role the Park should serve. Exploring these philosophical values can help
managers to understand what visitors expect from their experience and from the way in
which the Park is managed. Gaining insight into the values visitors deem important to
the Park offers managers a perspective on what the visitors may see as the priorities for
the park.
The items for this inquiry were developed from a discussion of the historical origins of
the park idea. The items represent properties of seven different broad categories of
values commonly associated with national parks. These items were then randomly
sorted within the question. Respondents were asked the extent to which they agreed or
disagreed with each of the items importance to the overall value of Anza-Borrego. The
scale ranged from one to five, one being “very unimportant” and five being “very
important”. Table 31 shows the means, medians, and standard deviations of each of the
items in the order the items were presented in the survey. All in all, respondents believe
that Anza-Borrego is highly important as a place for scenic beauty, unique
characteristics, wildness, nature displays and as a sanctuary for wildlife. According to
visitors, the Park’s role as an economic resource, a place to be free from society’s rules
and regulations, and a place for social interaction are relatively less important. Although
the rankings and magnitude of responses are relatively consistent across sample sites
(Table 31) and seasons (Table 32) the standard deviations suggest a fair amount of
variability among respondents on these items. In other words, each value listed is highly
important to some people and unimportant to others.
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