How Climbers’ Sensation of Recreation Impact and Recreation Experience Affect Their Environmental Attitudes and Environmentally Responsible Behaviors: A Case of Jiaming Lake National Trail

The outbreak of COVID-19 has significantly increased the number of climbers who enter reserve areas and use mountain houses compared with the same period in 2019. Mountaineering has become a popular activity causing forest managers to pay more attention in tourist environmentally responsible behavior (ERB) which is key to maintain land sustainable management. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to explore the influence of climbers’ sensations of recreation impact, the recreation experience, and environmental attitudes on ERB in Jiaming Lake National Trail. Questionnaires were distributed online through a Facebook fans social network. A total of 577 valid questionnaires were received in July 2021, and we used SPSS20.0 and SmartPLS3.3.9 software to analyze returned questionnaires. The research found: 1. The recreation experience has a positive and significant impact on both environmental attitudes and ERB. 2. The recreational impact directly affects both the recreation experience and environmental attitudes with negative and positive consequences. 3. The recreation experience has a partial mediating effect on the relationship between recreational impact and environmental attitudes; 4. Environmental attitudes have a full mediation effect on the relationship between recreational impact and ERB. Our findings indicate that with a better recreation experience, hikers increase their positive environmental attitude and ERB. However, the recreational impact is contradictory in that it reduces the recreation experience which indirectly worsens hikers’ environmental attitude. Interestingly, the environmental attitude does not mediate the relationship between the recreation experience and ERB.