A transactional model of stress and coping applied to cyclist subjective experiences

Abstract

Research indicates that subjective experiences such as happiness, joy, anxiety, and fear influence peoples’ decisions to bike ride. Negative user experiences in particular are a key barrier to increased bike riding participation. However, existing research has not considered the theoretical mechanisms that give rise to subjective experiences while bike riding. To achieve a more nuanced understanding necessary to enable subjective experiences to contribute to policy and planning, there is a need to both establish theoretically-informed definitions of what subjective experiences consist of, and common approaches to describing how they arise and can be measured. This conceptual paper addresses a translation gap between theory and existing research by applying the transactional model of stress and coping and the circumplex model of affect to demonstrate potential causal mechanisms and measurement approaches of bicycling-related subjective experiences. The transactional model of stress and coping proposes that individuals continuously appraise the demands of their environment relative to their coping abilities, stating that stress and negative emotions occur when an environment exceeds perceived coping abilities. The circumplex model of affect proposes that emotions exist on dimensions of valence and arousal, measuring the unpleasant-pleasantness and degree of activation of an emotion from low to high, respectively. By proposing theoretically-informed definitions and theoretical approaches, this paper establishes a framework that unifies existing research and enables a more nuanced understanding of individual differences in subjective experiences that can contribute to bicycling uptake.