Increasing Universal Change Room Usage
Creators: name: Ando, Rui
name: Chow, Meagan
name: Tsang, Louisa
name: Pihoc, Calvin
name: Trinh, Tiffany
Publisher: name: The University of British Columbia
Year: 2019

description: “Increasing Universal Change Room (UC) Usage,” is a project carried out by students of the Kinesiology 464: Health Promotion and Physical Activity, with the goal of promoting the universal change room to all ARC users and to increase the patronage of the communal facility. This project is designed by the Kinesiology students at the University of British Columbia, with the supervision of instructor, Negin Riazi, and teaching assistants, Matthew Fagan, Thalia Otamendi, and Clint Lemkus. In this project, the researchers conducted a mix method methodology to patrons of The ARC at the University of British Columbia - Vancouver Campus (UBC - Vancouver) in order to gain insight on how to improve one’s experience with regards to the UC. During the mentioned survey, the participants were asked about their perception with regards to their attitudes towards the UC, specifically to The ARC at UBC - Vancouver. The follow research paper is based on the findings and analysis done on twelve anonymous users of The ARC facility at the University of British Columbia. The main findings of this project are that there was a difference in the genders that would use the UC. Based on our findings, most males have used the UC multiple times compared to females. Also, males were generally more comfortable entering the UC compared to females. These findings suggests that males are more likely to utilize the UC due to comfortability while females are less likely to utilize the UC due to possible worries about safety. Through our findings, we were able to create four recommendations that The ARC management can carry out as possible ways to increase the amount of members that actively make use of the universal change room. The limitations the researchers faced through the duration of this study was the small sample size, randomization of the population, as well as the possibility that participants would be bias or answer our survey without effort. The implications of the study can be directed towards increasing female physical activity levels and the recommendations can be applied towards universal change rooms in any facility. This study found four main recommendations with regards to increasing patronage of the universal change room (UC) at The ARC at UBC - Vancouver: 1. Posters and signages that celebrates the UC inclusivity for all genders 2. Target Females to Increase Physical Activity 3. Additional Universal Change Room Signs 4. Staff Universal Change Room Training. Disclaimer: “UBC SEEDS provides students with the opportunity to share the findings of their studies, as well as their opinions, conclusions and recommendations with the UBC community. The reader should bear in mind that this is a student project/report and is not an official document of UBC. Furthermore readers should bear in mind that these reports may not reflect the current status of activities at UBC. We urge you to contact the research persons mentioned in a report or the SEEDS Coordinator about the current status of the subject matter of a project/report.”