NWT RESEARCH DATABASE

Regions: Inuvialuit Settlement Region, Gwich'in Settlement Area

Tags: social sciences, youth, travel safety

Objective(s): To better understand boating-related behaviours, attitudes, and levels awareness of boating safety, as well as to increase training and education opportunities, among residents of the Inuvialuit Settlement Region.

Project Description: This licence has been issued for the scientific research application No.4534. The goal of this project is to better understand boating-related behaviours, attitudes, and levels awareness of boating safety, as well as to increase training and education opportunities, among residents of the Inuvialuit Settlement Region. The research questions are as follows: 1) what are boating behaviours and attitudes in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region? and, 2) what equipment is needed to promote boating safety in the region? The specific objectives are as follows: 1) to reduce the loss of life, injuries, and property damage due to boating incidents in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region, by encouraging safe boating practices and compliance with regulations through education, awareness and information; and2) to produce and circulate materials that improve and promote boating safety in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region, NWT. The research team will be using a community-based participatory research (CBPR) methodology to both develop the intervention and to evaluate it. Here, the team will focus on evaluation CBPR practitioners attempt to strengthen a community's problem-solving capacity through collective engagement in the research process. A participatory approach that includes community members in all aspects of its design also allows for the innovative adaptation of existing resources and can lead to creative solutions specific to the community. Likert scales are five-point bipolar responses with which many people are familiar. They are helpful in identifying knowledge and attitude changes when given pre/post intervention. The boating safety courses can be considered an intervention, and thus Likert scales will be administered before and after these courses to see the degree to which training was able to change participants’ knowledge and attitudes (i.e., the efficacy of the training). The research team will use an ordered logit regression to assess the effect of the intervention on changes in attitude and planned behaviours. These scales will be completed as part of participation in the focus group. Structured observation is a non-intrusive form of research where structured observations are made using a checklist. In this case, the research team will be using observational research to examine lifejacket (Who is in the boat – age, sex, are boaters wearing lifejackets or other flotation devices, etc.) use at baseline (pre-intervention) and post-intervention. The research team will also complete voluntary inventories of boating safety equipment in community members’ boats and those available for loan/purchase in each community. The team will use multiple method of information dissemination. First, digital copies of all materials will be provided that will be co-develop with community members, stakeholders, Canadian Safe Boating Council and its members. The team will create Instagram and Twitter accounts to document the activities throughout the grant to increase awareness of and interest in the process and outcomes. These accounts will be managed by the Principal Investigator. The research team will invite the Inuvik Drum, CBC North, local radio, and News/North to the events so that they receive media coverage. The research team will also send press releases to these media outlets. The intended audience are those who use boats in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region: Elders, adults, youth/children. The fieldwork for this study will be conducted from August 1, 2019 to December 31, 2019.