Existing research in campus recreation establishes a relationship between facility use and academic outcomes, but published studies define users differently. In response to inconsistent definitions of participants in campus recreation, this study uses a data-driven approach to compare facility use definitions. Authors illustrate the implications of choosing different participant definitions for relationships between campus recreation and two undergraduate academic outcomes, first-year retention and first-year cumulative grade point average (GPA). This study uses data from a three-year timeframe, linking sources of data on students’ recreation facility use, academic outcomes, and student records. Authors provide a summary of previous definitions, results from original regression analyses, results for specific student subgroups, and recommendations for defining users.
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