Environmental attitudes of participants in the Oklahoma 4-H Philmont Outdoor Adventure Program

The purpose of this study was to determine if differences existed in the environmental attitudes of current and past participants in the Oklahoma 4-H Philmont Outdoor Adventure program. The Millward-Ginter Outdoor Attitude Inventory was the instrument utilized to pre and post-test subjects on overall outdoor attitude and specific attitudes toward environment, socialization, education and pollution. Sixty-eight youth and 26 adults were surveyed. Findings showed that demographics characteristics did differ in the participation of the subjects, the age of the subject and the family income of the male subjects. Participants had a positive attitude toward the outdoors both at the entry and completion of the experience. Adults had a more positive attitude toward the outdoors than the youth. First-time participants pretest socialization attitude was not as positive as that of returning and non-returning participants. Positive attitudes were strengthened, but the change was not found to be statistically significant.