National Study on Reckless Ski / Ride Behavior

[martyg]

The Marketing Research class within the School of Business Administration at Fort Lewis College (in Durango, CO) is conducting research on on-slope collisions / injuries. This research is being conducted under the mentorship of a panel of industry experts.

Your input will be an invaluable part of the research. As a next step in our process, we are interviewing patrollers, instructors, skiers and snowboarders to understand their specific perspective. These interviews will last approximately 20 to 30 minutes, will be conducted via Zoom, and will be recorded with your permission. To protect your confidentiality, no names or other identifiable information will be included when reporting on the findings of our research.

Note that at this point we can only interview a small number of individuals. The interviews will help us craft a survey that will launch in November, as part of which everyone will have an opportunity to voice their experiences.

In exchange for your participation, we will be providing the interview participants with an Osprey Daylite pack ($65 value). If you are interested in participating in an interview, please email [email protected]. Please indicate if you are a skier, snowboarder, patroller, instructor, and how many days per year you ski or snowboard.

Thanks so much.

 

[Nobody]

Since you titled it "National..." I guess there is no plan as of now in researching abroad behaviours, right?

 

[martyg]

Since you titled it "National..." I guess there is no plan as of now in researching abroad behaviours, right?

Correct. However we are on contact with an government agency in NZ that ran something in the same realm.

Perhaps our work will be a point of inspiration to colleges and universities in other countries.

 

[Chuck danache]

Who qualifies as an “Industry Expert”?

 

[RNZ]

Correct. However we are on contact with an government agency in NZ that ran something in the same realm.

Perhaps our work will be a point of inspiration to colleges and universities in other countries.

Interesting. Having skied in both countries it will be interesting to see how the results compare. Once you have allowed for terrain (no trees, lots more rocks and whiteout in nz), and maybe terrain park differences between the two countries. It feels like there might be a lag in nz with high speed accidents, there seem to be more meat missiles lately. If using the nz data as a comparison you might also want to control for type of ski area, most of the club fields here have rooe tows and do not groom terrain (mt cheeseman) being the exception.

The nz data should be pretty good if it is ACC data because you need to make an ACC claim to access subsidies for physiotherapy and if there might be future treatment, so generally a claim is filed as a precaution

 

[martyg]

Who qualifies as an “Industry Expert”?
If you were in an upper management capacity in the industry, or served on national boards or committees, you would immediately recognize the names. A web site is being constructed that will include bios.

 

[martyg]

Interesting. Having skied in both countries it will be interesting to see how the results compare. Once you have allowed for terrain (no trees, lots more rocks and whiteout in nz), and maybe terrain park differences between the two countries. It feels like there might be a lag in nz with high speed accidents, there seem to be more meat missiles lately. If using the nz data as a comparison you might also want to control for type of ski area, most of the club fields here have rooe tows and do not groom terrain (mt cheeseman) being the exception.

The nz data should be pretty good if it is ACC data because you need to make an ACC claim to access subsidies for physiotherapy and if there might be future treatment, so generally a claim is filed as a precaution

It won’t be apples to apples as far as data. However there will be a bit of overlap.

 

[Nobody]

@RNZ , don't discount, in the differentiating factors that might render a comparison not "apple to apple" (in @martyg words) the cultural aspects of each specific country.
E.G. Austria and Switzerland (and I'd say Slovenia as well) where downhill ski is THE National Sport, would most probably heed very different results in comparison to many other countries (Italy included)...

 

[fatbob]

@RNZ , don't discount, in the differentiating factors that might render a comparison not "apple to apple" (in @martyg words) the cultural aspects of each specific country.
E.G. Austria and Switzerland (and I'd say Slovenia as well) where downhill ski is THE National Sport, would most probably heed very different results in comparison to many other countries (Italy included)...

I think most places get enough tourists to make them more homogeneous in relation to risky skiing than you might think. I guess a small locals only hill in one of the alpine countries might be different and don't know a lot about Slovenian skiing as it's harder to get to for me (guess they draw a fair number of visitors from across Eastern Europe).

 

[slow-line-fast]

Important topic and cool class project.

 

[martyg]

Update:

- The class has conducted qualitative interviews of skiers around the country.
- These interviews consisted of open ended questions that were vetted by Fort Lewis College’s Institution Review Board.
-The students, working with industry mentors and faculty, will use the data from the qualitative interviews to craft the quantitative survey.
- Expect to see that survey the first few weeks of November.

The more skiers / riders that participate, the more data points, the better.

Thanks so much.

 

[dbostedo]

Update:

- The class has conducted qualitative interviews of skiers around the country.
- These interviews consisted of open ended questions that were vetted by Fort Lewis College’s Institution Review Board.
-The students, working with industry mentors and faculty, will use the data from the qualitative interviews to craft the quantitative survey.
- Expect to see that survey the first few weeks of November.

The more skiers / riders that participate, the more data points, the better.

Thanks so much.

I emailed them and received a reply that they'd be in touch about interviews, but may not get to everyone. I haven't heard back since... so maybe they have enough folks?

 

[socalgal]

I emailed them and received a reply that they'd be in touch about interviews, but may not get to everyone. I haven't heard back since... so maybe they have enough folks?

Same here.

 

[James]

Yeah they didn’t want me either.

 

[martyg]

I emailed them and received a reply that they'd be in touch about interviews, but may not get to everyone. I haven't heard back since... so maybe they have enough folks?

Thanks so much to everyone who responded.

Given the appointment 30 minute interview time the number of participants who could be interviewed was limited. The limiters were student time, and when perspective interviewees we’re available.

Watch for the quantitative survey the beginning of November. It will be everyone’s opportunity to weigh in.

Images: class in session, with industry mentors participating via Zoom.