The Meanings of Leisure

Abstract

W ITH modern social trends, the time which people have for leisure activities is tending increase. This phenomenon has come be of concern those who feel that people may not be equipped make the most satisfying use of their leisure. The problem is a particularly pertinent one as retirement age tends fall, but is not unimportant at earlier stages of life. Empirical studies of leisure activity have tended concentrate on the allocation of available time various types of activity with the relative neglect of dynamic variables related motivations behind the choice of leisure activities or satisfactions which such activities afford. The aim of the present study is find out about the meanings that people perceive in their leisure activities, and how these meanings are related the content of age, sex, social class, and personality characteristics. The approach used is ask people what their favorite leisure activities are and what satisfactions they get from these activities. The expression of a felt satisfaction or a reason for carrying on a particular leisure activity, such as watching television, or gardening, is called a meaning. Thus the definition of a of leisure, as here used, is what the actor says a favorite activity means him in terms of the satisfactions he gets from it. What we did was study the meanings attributed their favorite leisure activities by a sample of people. A spontaneous choice of favorite activity, together with the satisfactions derived therefrom, afforded salient responses at the behavioral level. A related study of leisure has been reported by one of the authors,' in which the two favorite leisure activities of people were analyzed in terms of a set of variables. Significance was a general term applied a set of 19 variables which are assumed be characteristic of leisure activity and which presumably have some personal and social significance. In this case the significance variables were defined by the research team and were applied by means of rating scales the interviews in which the respondent talked about his favorite leisure activities and what they meant him. Thus was what a reader of the interview assessed as characteristic of a leisure activity for a particular person, while was the kind of satisfaction the person himself said he obtained from a leisure activity. Some of the meaning and significance variables were quite similar (e.g., creativity was a significance variable and to be creative was a meaning variable) while others were not parallel. There were two principal hypotheses be tested: 1. Meanings are systematically related the content of preferred leisure activities. 2. Meanings are systematically related age, sex, social class, and personal characteristics. A third and subordinate hypothesis was that adults in New Zealand and the United States would find similar meanings in their favorite leisure activities.