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by Sylvia Dresser Attarian, Aram and G. Thomas Holden. The Literature and Research on Challenge Courses: An annotated bibliography. North Carolina State University, Department of Parks, Recreation & Tourism Management, and Alpine Towers International, 2001. The question arises often in the challenge course field – how do we know this works? How do we convince administrators that a challenge course is in fact a viable tool for whatever work we are doing – corporate, school based, therapeutic? This bibliography gives us a good starting point for finding research to answer these questions. The authors begin with a narrative section outlining why they put this bibliography together, and defining “challenge course”, as well as including the criteria they used for inclusion of the 90 references in this bibliography. Individual sections then follow: Individual Benefits [of the challenge course, one presumes], Teambuilding, Professional Issues, Risk Management, Accessible and Universal Challenge Courses, Physiology and Books, Newsletters and Organizations. Each section has a short explanation of the topics covered in it. For example, the section on Professional Issues states that it “offers insight into subject matter that has practical application for challenge course practitioners.” Citations come from well established journals as well as the slightly obscure, such as the proceedings from AEE conferences, which might be hard to find. The books section in the back is a bit short, listing only 13 books, but brings in some unusual titles, such as the work of Harrison Snow, who is much less well known in this arena than Karl Rohnke, also listed. A major ommission in the newsletters section is the Ripple Effect! Because of the 2001 date, there are works which are not included here. Watch for an update. All in all, a good starting point for research in the Challenge Course field specifically, a good contribution as this literature is not always easy to find. Available from Adventure Hardware, www.adventurehardware.com. Sylvia Dresser
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