Fe­ma­le Youth Par­ti­ci­pa­ti­on in Out­door Ad­ven­ture Ac­ti­vi­ties and Re­si­li­ence: A Re­tro­s­pec­ti­ve Qua­li­ta­ti­ve Stu­dy

Out­door Ad­ven­ture Ac­ti­vi­ties (OAA) show pro­mi­se in their abili­ty to po­si­tively im­pact re­si­li­ence in youth. Ho­we­ver, re­se­arch into the im­pacts of the­se ex­pe­ri­en­ces on wo­men is lack­ing. This pa­per pres­ents the fin­dings of a stu­dy which ai­med to gain in­sight into how OAA par­ti­ci­pa­ti­on du­ring youth might im­pact women’s re­si­li­ence. Ten wo­men, who had en­ga­ged in OAA du­ring youth, took part in fo­cus groups, and com­ple­ted a crea­ti­ve task ex­pres­sing their par­ti­ci­pa­ti­on ex­pe­ri­en­ces. The­ma­tic ana­ly­sis iden­ti­fied four main the­mes: ‘I Can!’, The Im­pact of Others, Ma­na­ging Stress and Risk, and Free­dom. The­se par­ti­ci­pan­ts per­cei­ved OAA du­ring youth to have in­fluen­ced their re­si­li­ence. The im­pacts were main­ly, alt­hough not ex­clu­si­ve­ly, po­si­ti­ve. The the­mes are ex­plo­red and dis­cus­sed wi­thin the con­text of exis­ting re­se­arch, il­lus­tra­ted by the art­work of the par­ti­ci­pan­ts. The pa­per pres­ents con­side­ra­ti­ons for the de­sign and fa­ci­li­ta­ti­on of OAA with fe­ma­le youth to ma­xi­mi­se be­ne­fits on re­si­li­ence.