The Case for Evidence-Based Outdoor Recreation Interventions for Girls: Helping Girls “Find Their Voice” in the Outdoors

Evans, Kate; Walters, Kellie; Anderson, Denise

doi:10.3390/educsci10120363

Open AccessCommunication

The Case for Evidence-Based Outdoor Recreation Interventions for Girls: Helping Girls “Find Their Voice” in the Outdoors

by

Kate Evans

¹,

Kellie Walters

^2,*

and

Denise Anderson

³

¹

Department of Recreation Management and Therapeutic Recreation, University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, La Crosse, WI 54601, USA

²

Department of Kinesiology, California State University, Long Beach, CA 90840, USA

³

College of Behavioral, Social, and Health Sciences, Clemson University, Clemson, SC 29634, USA

^*

Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.

Educ. Sci. 2020, 10(12), 363; https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci10120363

Submission received: 10 September 2020 / Revised: 20 November 2020 / Accepted: 27 November 2020 / Published: 29 November 2020

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Outdoor Adventure Education: Trends and New Directions)

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Abstract

Females’ participation in outdoor recreation is often limited for a variety of reasons including social gender norms, a lack of exposure, and fear. Research has uncovered a wide range of positive outcomes for those females who do participate ranging from enhanced self-esteem and confidence to improved body image, indicating the importance of opening the outdoors as a welcoming place for all to experience. Finding Your Voice is a recreation intervention created with the focus of introducing middle school girls to outdoor recreation to increase the participants’ self-efficacy and self-empowerment. Empirical research focusing on participant experiences has demonstrated promising results and the best practices from Finding Your Voice and the broader research on female empowerment in the outdoors are presented.

Keywords: outdoor recreation; female empowerment; single-gender; adolescent programming; adolescent girls; outdoor camp; girls’ camp; youth development

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MDPI and ACS Style

Evans, K.; Walters, K.; Anderson, D. The Case for Evidence-Based Outdoor Recreation Interventions for Girls: Helping Girls “Find Their Voice” in the Outdoors. Educ. Sci. 2020, 10, 363. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci10120363

AMA Style

Evans K, Walters K, Anderson D. The Case for Evidence-Based Outdoor Recreation Interventions for Girls: Helping Girls “Find Their Voice” in the Outdoors. Education Sciences. 2020; 10(12):363. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci10120363

Chicago/Turabian Style

Evans, Kate, Kellie Walters, and Denise Anderson. 2020. "The Case for Evidence-Based Outdoor Recreation Interventions for Girls: Helping Girls “Find Their Voice” in the Outdoors" Education Sciences 10, no. 12: 363. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci10120363

APA Style

Evans, K., Walters, K., & Anderson, D. (2020). The Case for Evidence-Based Outdoor Recreation Interventions for Girls: Helping Girls “Find Their Voice” in the Outdoors. Education Sciences, 10(12), 363. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci10120363

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The Case for Evidence-Based Outdoor Recreation Interventions for Girls: Helping Girls “Find Their Voice” in the Outdoors

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