From: altar@beaufort.sfu.ca (Ted Wayn Altar)
Subject: Re: Why Hunters Quit
Organization: Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C., Canada
Date: Wed, 15 Apr 1992 21:01:32 GMT

robinson@ac.dal.ca writes:

>In article <altar.703144584@sfu.ca>, altar@beaufort.sfu.ca (Ted Wayn Altar) writes:
>> 
>>  
>>      What stated reasons do hunters themselves give for quitting?
>> Believe it not, not only a few quit, but quite a significant
>> number within a short period of time from first starting.  That
>> was the question posed to 296 people who first hunted in New
>> Jersey in 1976 but who did not purchase a hunting licence in
>> 1981.

>So what we have here are not folks who have learned hunting as kids, but 

Where did you get this assumption from?  Please, look up the study
or ask before you presume facts that are not the case.

From the larger sample of 997 graduates (selected from the pop. of 16,021
who completed the course, 198 of the respondents were < 14, 
their desertion rate after 5 years was 32%.  Among those who began
hunting when 14 or older, their desertion rate after 5 seasons was
62%.

>those who decided to try it out?  So they first hunted in '76 and didn't 
>purchase a license in '81.  Was '81 the *first* year they did not purchase 
>a license?  What I'm trying to get a handle on is how long, exactly, they 
>stuck with it.

The most complete description of license-buying behaviour was derived
from the responses of 393 respondents who were contacted in all 4 "waves"
of the study ('76, '78, '79, '81).   Participation declined steadily:
'76 = 87.2%, '77 = 81.2%, '79 = 64%, '81 = 51.4%.   Hence, the
average annual rate of attrition was 8.1%

Other studies have shown that much desertion occurs with 5 years of 
inititiation (see Applegate, "Dynamics of the New Jersey hunter
pop."  TRANS. NORTH AM. WILDL. AND NAT. RESOUR. CONF., '77, 42:267-
73;  Applegate et al., "Dynamic aspects of the American sport
hunting pop." REP. TO U.S. FISH AND WILD. SERV., '85;
Applegate & Otto, "Characteristics of 1st year hunters in New
Jersey".  N.J. AGRIC. EXP. STN. BULL. '82, r-12381-(1)-82;
Brown et al., "The future of hunting in New York"  TRANS.
NORTH AM. WILDL. AND NAT. RESOUR. CONF., '87, 53:553-66).

The pattern of desertion is real and is not simply founded upon this
sample of 296 deserters who were interview in 1981 and presented with
a "series of reasons why they may have quit hunting"


>It is interesting to note that many other activities suffer from a high 
>turnover rate of potentially new enthusiasts.  Fencing is one such 
>. . ..
>thought it would be, some just find it boring.  The list goes on.  The 
>point is that this says more about the potential enthusiasts than it does 
>about the activity itself.

I've already addressed this comparison with other activities in
my message to Joe.   Now, you might well be right about the
the results saying something more about the deserters than about
the sport, but the kinds of other activities that you've mentioned
are not declining but growing.  This is not the case with hunting.
See the above references.  Also, we are dealing not with people
off the street, but with people committed enough to pay and enroll
in a course and even hunt for at least one season.



>>  
>>      Over the past decade there has been about a 30% overall

>Now, why 296 people?  How were they sampled from the 30%? Are they 
>representative of this 30%?

See the ref. above for Brown and al. for this figure of 30%
No, they are not completely representative, since, as clearly
stated, we are only looking at "early desertion" that occurs
within the first 5 years of starting hunting.  As noted above, 50%
of these new initiates desert within 5 years, and our author
concludes that "this steady increase probably has much to do
with the 30% decline in New Jersey's hunting-licence sales
over the past decade, and may be involved in changes in the
population of hunters in other states".  See Brown et al.
again for some futher data, if you are REALLY interested
about the larger population of deserters.  Again,
my focus was delimited, no one study should ever be presumed
to answer all questions or even most questions concerning
any one complex social phenomena.


>> decline in New Jersey's hunting-licence sales.  You can be
>> assured that the "wildlife management" officials are mighty
>> worried since the larger portion of their salaries comes from
>> these licence sales.  Such, is the weakness of a system of
>> wildlife "protection" that would make that system depended upon a
>> vested interest group (hence, we have not wildlife protection,
>> but "management").  The following results were compiled by

>Actually, this kind of a 'user pay' system generally works quite well.  
>There is a recession on after all, even government jobs are not necessarily 
>safe.

I works all too well to promote the vested interests of only one
user group (and we should not neglect the interests of wildlife
itself to live "unmanaged").  As I already suggested, such
user fees should simply go into the general treasury so as not
to make our wildlife officials so beholden to hunters as their de
facto employers.  We all want wildlife officials to protect
wildlife on the basis of sound science and ecology, not on
the basis of politics.  What better way to ensure that then
by making their funding more independent of any one user or
interest group.

You said that you saw noting wrong with the terminology of
"desertion" among hunters.  Don't you see what is being
implied by that term?  It reveals the kind of worry wildlife
officials have for their decreasing hunting licence sales.
That was my modest point.



B

>Ok.  Lets see.  There are other things these 'deserters' like to do better. 
> So this implies that 'hunting inherently is not all that interesting or 
>challenging'?  I don't think so.  It implies that hunting is less apealing 
>to them than their other activities, which says far more about their tastes 
>than it does about hunting.
> . . . 

Again, it seems that my appeal for a suspension of self-reference  
is to be completely ignored.  What's wrong here?  Can't you guys
just for once leave off with personal testimonies?  We are not
talking about you who still hunt, but about those who quit.  Let's
just try to understand these people on their own terms, as expressed
in their own self-reports collectively combined.




>convinced that the 'deserters' are threatening the sport.  I think that AR 
>folks who go out of their way to insure that childern anthropomorphise 
>animals at a very early age threaten the sport of hunting much more 
>seriously than any 'deserters'.

You are now even presuming to speak for us AR folk, what we do in
our spare time, etc.  Believe it not, the Disney bunch are NOT
AR folk.  Here is another statement of fact.  Donald Hebb,
a famous psychologist, actually had students attempt to get to
know some primates at Yerks laboratories.  One group simply 
adopted your garden variety "anthropomorphic" characterizations
of the chimps, the other group adopted the then scientifically
respectable observational language of strict behavourism.  Guess
which group better PREDICTED chimp behaviour?  Well, it turns out
that our anthropomorphising students far out-performed our more
neutral, de-anthropomorphized observational language-bound students.

So it is not just AR folk, but respectable zoologist and ethologists
who have recognized that a circumspect anthropomorphism tempered with
naturalism is the best means for understanding animal behaviour.
In fact, I believe that you have done this repeatedly in your own 
discussions about deer.  Have you not use the mentalist language
of "fear", "weariness", "fatique", etc. when describing animal
behaviour?.



>Hunting firearm deaths and injuries have been substantially reduced and almost 
>completely eliminated here.  
> . . .

 How about some numbers so that we can compare the risk of being injured or
killed via hunting  with say, being murdered or maimed by other people
in the city.  Take a look at my note to Joe about how we are such poor 
estimators of risk.  Better still, take a look at my r.f.v. posting
about "risk", for some good examples...



>>  
>>      Note that only 1 in 5 chose ethics (5th on the list) as one
>> of the reasons prompting their not bothering to purchase a
>> hunting licence.  Not very impressive, is it?  With respect to

>Actually, I find it very impressive.  It tells me that despite massive 
>programs, the AR folks haven't been very successful at instilling their 
>view of ethics into our society.
 
My point exactly.  Hunters are simply not easily moved by ethical
considerations of killing animals.  So, John, are you going to
stop berating us AR folk for threatening your "sport"?  ;-)

                                            ted




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