City Research Online

Abstract

This thesis aims to examine the social, experiential, and physical impact of digital technologies across three phases of the camping experience: from the pre-trip planning phase, the onsite phase, and finally the post-trip experience. Digital technologies are increasingly pervasive during camping. It is, therefore, important to understand how they facilitate and mediate this popular form of recreation. Camping within the United States, and more broadly the natural environment, has particular antimodern and escapist meanings associated with it that are often in opposition to technological culture, thus introducing tensions into the experience when digital technologies are used. These tensions revolve around uncertainty, safety, and presence, which are the concepts that inform the conceptual and theoretical framework.

My thesis is driven by the following questions. What digital strategies do campers employ to navigate the pre-trip planning experience? How does the use of digital technologies impact perceptions of safety during the camping trip? How does digital connectivity affect how individuals socially and physically experience the camping trip onsite and afterwards? These questions are addressed using a qualitative methodology that involves a variety of campers, including those that use traditional public campsites and peer-to-peer accommodation platforms, being interviewed about how they use digital technologies before, during, and after the onsite phase of a camping trip.

The findings of this research indicate that campers use a variety of digital strategies to manage expectations and minimize risk in the pre-trip phase, but this paradoxically can increase the uncertainty that is experienced. This study also finds that the way that technology is used to mitigate risks during the experience depends on how digitally connected the environment is, as well as whether or not it is within a digitally mediated hospitality context. This study also illuminates that digital technologies are being used, or not, in the onsite and post-trip phases in order to enhance social and sensory presence and preserve a sense of liminality. As little empirical research has been conducted that examines how the use of digital technologies may alter the experience of camping, and in turn, our understanding of both our relationship to the practice as well as the digital technologies that are employed throughout, my research advances an understanding of this important area of study.

Publication Type:	Thesis (Doctoral)
Subjects:	G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > GV Recreation Leisure H Social Sciences > HM Sociology Z Bibliography. Library Science. Information Resources > ZA Information resources > ZA4050 Electronic information resources
Departments:	School of Policy & Global Affairs > Department of Sociology & Criminology School of Policy & Global Affairs > School of Policy & Global Affairs Doctoral Theses Doctoral Theses

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