Benefits of botanical garden visitation: A means-end study

Abstract

Botanical gardens vary widely in design and purpose, but most are typically associated with environmental conservation, education, or historical interpretation. Yet, studies have shown that botanical garden visitors are often motivated by recreational and leisure interests. While visitor motivations and benefits have been the focus of a number of botanical garden and green space visitor studies, this research has often been conducted without a theoretical backdrop. This study employed means-end theory to investigate the links visitors make between garden attributes, consequences, and values. In-person interviews were conducted with 83 garden visitors during the spring and summer of 2011 at a university botanical garden. Overall, the findings revealed that participants felt that the botanical garden and plants were the most meaningful garden attributes, leading participants to experience the consequences new experiences and learning, and stress relief and relaxation, and finally reaching the most frequently mentioned values: transference and improved quality of life. Analysis revealed no meaningful differences between visitation outcomes for males and female. For students, visiting the botanical garden lead to stress relief and relaxation and the value of improved quality of life, while non-students reported that their visits increased their fun and enjoyment of life. Those participants who work or go to school on campus reported an important means-end chain that led from escape to stress relief and relaxation to improved quality of life, which was not present for campus’ visitors. The results indicate that botanical gardens should be managed to provide a rich, overall experience that promotes relaxation, in addition to maintaining a healthy, interesting, and diverse collection of plant materials that enables visitors to experience new plants and enables opportunities for learning.