The Spanish canyonist: sociodemographic profile, motivations for practice and propensity for accidents

Abstract

This article analyzes the sociodemographic profile, the motivations of practice and the propensity to accidents of people who practice canyoning in Spain. The study was carried out using a questionnaire (n = 594). The sociodemographic profile was analyzed using a Principal Component Analysis to find out how their motivations to practice canyoning were grouped. These groupings were then used to perform a cluster analysis in order to obtain significant groups of participants according to their practice motivations. Finally, possible differences between clusters were analyzed using ANOVA with post hoc tests with the Bonferroni correction for continuous variables, and chi-square tests or Fisher's exact test for categorical variables. The main results showed that people who practice canyoning tend to be mostly men, with an average age of 39 years, single, with the profession of civil servant, businessman and / or self-employed, without university studies or formal (official) qualifications and with experience between 1 and 5 years. Considering the motivations of practice, three dimensions were identified: the hedonistic, the social and the experiential. For its part, the cluster analysis allowed the identification of three types of canyoning practitioners: (1) pioneer canyoning; (2) started professional canyoning, and (3) consolidated professional canyoning; which differed statistically significantly in sociodemographic variables and practice habits, but not in accident rate. From these results and with the aim of promoting the practice of canyoning, some recommendations are proposed.