To test if experience was associated with attitude we compared attitude scores

between those respondents that had seen manatees while boating, seen manatees while

swimming, visited an area to see a manatee or participated in an education program about

manatees, and those who had not had these experiences; there were no significant

differences (Table 14). In fact, boaters who had seen manatees 5 or less times in the past

year had a significantly higher attitude score than those who had seen manatees 6 or more

times (t 3.00, df= 460, p 0.003).

Table 14. Comparisons of average attitude scores with experience with manatee items
 Yes No
 Mean Mean
 score n S.D. score n S.D t p df
 Have you seen manatees
 while boating? 33.42 462 7.22 33.16 43 7.83 .225 0.82 503
 Have you seen manatees
 while swimming? 32.86 215 7.74 33.81 287 6.86 -1.47 0.14 500
 Visited an area to see a
 manatee 33.59 270 7.04 33.18 235 7.53 .619 0.53 503
 Participated in an
 educational program
 about manatees. 34.44 82 7.58 33.21 422 7.19 1.34 0.16 502

 Attitude was negatively correlated with the number of times someone had seen a

manatee while boating (r = -0.105, p = 0.024), but there was no correlation with the

number of times seeing manatees while swimming (Table 15). Attitude was negatively

correlated with years of boating experience (r = -0.103, p = 0.021), but not with the

number of times boating in Tampa Bay in the past year (Table 15).

 Attitude was positively correlated with maintaining a slower speed while boating

(r = 0.279, p = 0.000) and watching out for manatees in shallow water (r = 0.279,

p =0.000) (Table 15).