How personality and risk-taking attitude affect the behavior of adventure recreationists

Scientific understanding of the relationships among the personality, risk-taking attitude, and behavior of adventure-based recreationists is limited. This study examines how personality and risk-taking attitude affect adventure behavior for two different adventure recreation activities (white water rafting and scuba diving) in Taiwan. A total of 843 usable questionnaires were collected and analyzed. The empirical results indicate that the risk-taking attitude of recreationists positively and significantly influences adventure behavior and that the recreationists' personality traits positively and significantly influence their risk-taking attitude in white water rafting and scuba diving activities. Extraversion and openness traits positively and significantly influence the risk-taking attitude of both groups of recreationists, but a negative relationship between conscientiousness and risk-taking attitude was found only in scuba divers. The managerial implications of this study are discussed, and recommendations for future research are presented.