REC3000 Leisure in Your Life

January 25, 2012

Topics

• Define recreation• Define leisure• (3) primary approaches to defining leisure• Paradigm shift• Veblen• MacCannell• Leisure Era?• Protestant Work Ethic

Topics

• Define generations• Generation X• Nexters• Baby Boomers• Veterans• Society and its impact on leisure/recreation.

What are they?• U.S. is the only industrialized nation without

mandated paid vacations

Twenge

Topics

• Twenge• Spillover Theory• Compensatory Theory• Agricultural Era versus Industrialized Era

versus Post-Modern Society…differences in the way leisure was viewed and used

• Deviant Recreation- a social construct?

Topics

• Contract worker• Algorithm and relationship to “work”• U.N. Declaration of Human Rights and leisure• Periodic Holidays with Pay• Variables of Life Satisfaction• Time• 3 Categories of time

Use of Time

• Time Diaries• Joe Robinson– Work-Life Balance

• DeGraaf- Time Poverty and Overwork Organization

• Juliet Schor• Fareed Zakaria– CNN Contributor– Author “The Post-American World”

Time

• Americans work longer hours- 350 additional hours a year- than their European counterparts (Stanford, 2002)

• We work even more than medieval peasants did (Edginton, 1997)

• American’s Time Use Survey– Government time-diary study (n=20,000+)

2010 Time Use Survey

• Typical Day– Daily Leisure 5.8/5.1– 2.7 hours per day watching TV- top activity– Largest leisure time cohort: 75 and Over (7.7)– 7.5 hours average workday– 24% did some or all of their work at home– Average day, household activities (84/67)

Time

• Most free time comes on weekdays, not weekends; Average 35-40 hours of free time per week

• How many more hours of free time do men have than women? About 4 hours a week

• Reading for pleasure is well under one half hour per day overall

• Only 13% of free time is spent in organizational, civic, and religious activity

TED Talks

• Stefan Sagmeister: The Power of Time Off

Sabbaticals

• Should we have them?• Would it help our economy?• Would employers question it?• Long-term RTW Budget trip?– Cultural– Rite of Passage– Expected– When should it happen? Or should it happen at

all?

Define Life Satisfaction

• No universally accepted definitions

• Class indicated money contributed to life satisfaction. Why do we buy things?

• Depend on societal priorities? What “toys” show one is “successful” in this society? The Jones

• Societal priorities location contingent?

Menzel

Menzel

Variables for life satisfaction

• Subjective– Work, community, standard of living

• Demographic– Age, income, gender, education

• Psychological– Social contact, personality, creativity

Wilson (1967)

• Life satisfaction research. More likely to be:• Young• Healthy• Well-educated• Well paid• Extroverted• Optimistic• Religious• Married person • High self-esteem• High job morale

Creative Class

• Flocking to areas providing high quality of life• Positions allow mobility• Knowledge Workers– Drucker came up the term and defines knowledge

workers as “people who get paid for putting to work what one learns in school rather than for their physical strength or manual skill” (Pink, p.29)

• Recreation, leisure, and time are important

Creative Class

• Work Environment

– Changing– Allows for work/life balance• Identity becomes more diversified

– Focused on output– Requires intrinsic motivation, self-regulation

Community Satisfaction and Quality of Life

• Best Places to Live

– Kiplinger, U.S. News and World Report, Forbes, Money Magazine

– Globally- Mercer Video– Globally- Mercer (website)

Life Satisfaction and Community Well-Being

• Allen and Beattie (1984) found that how affluent a community is the top influence on community satisfaction– Tax dollars correlation?

• Leisure ranked fifth

Benefits of Leisure

• Physical

• Psychological

• Social– Space– Community

Leisure Industry

Leisure as a commodity

Public Recreation Non-Profit Recreation Private Recreation

Quality of Life (p.49)

• Seven key domains (Cummins, 1996)– Health

• Physical• Mental

– Material• Income• Savings• Things

– Productivity• Employment• School

Quality of Life (p.49)

• Seven key domains (Cummins, 1996)– Health

• Physical• Mental

– Material• Income• Savings• Things

– Productivity• Employment• School

Quality of Life (p.49)

• (Cummins, 1996, contd.)• Intimacy

– Social support/family/friends• Safety

– Privacy– Locus of control– Physical safety

• Community– Interaction/bonding

• Emotional– Spiritual

Quality of Life (p.49)

• (Cummins, 1996, contd.)• Intimacy

– Social support/family/friends• Safety

– Privacy– Locus of control– Physical safety

• Community– Interaction/bonding

• Emotional– Spiritual

Kelly and Godbey (1992)

“Found the most important aspect of leisure is its ability to promote social bonding. Anything that supports a sense of family (loosely defined) will benefit the community” (p.17)

Third Places

Myers (2000)

• Happy people are:– Less self-focused– Less hostile– Less abusive– Less vulnerable to disease– More loving– More forgiving– More trusting, energetic, decisive, creative,

sociable, and helpful.

Seligman (2002)

• Confirms Wilson’s review– People are happy when they are:

• Well paid• Married• Young• Healthy• Well-educated• Religious

Happiness

• Tends to be lower among the very poor (Myers, 2000)

• Correlation between income and personal happiness is weak (Inglehart, 1989)

• More people strive for extrinsic goals such as monetary gain, the less robust is their well-being (Myers, 2000)

• Depends on variables being measured

Happiest Cities

• Simon Anholt and GFK Custom Research (www.forbes.com 9/2/9 by Greenburg)

• Brazil• Sydney• Barcelona• Amsterdam• Melbourne• Methods: Online surveys from 20 countries

(n=10,000); Survey of perception

Bhutan Tourism Policy

• Necessary itinerary• Price per day– $200 per day; add $40 per day for individual

‘packages’• Visa issued before confirming flight• Plans should be finalized (including visa) a

minimum of 60 days prior to travel• Fly in on Druk Airline

Tourism

• Sport Tourism• Eco-Tourism• Sustainable Tourism• Alco-tourism• Dark Tourism• Heritage Tourism• Educational Tourism