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Meanings of Xiū Xián and Leisure: Cross-Cultural Exploration of Laypeople’s Definition of Leisure
Abstract
We examined meanings of leisure and a Chinese leisure-like term (i.e., xiū xián) from laypeople’s perspectives by modifying Ito and Walker’s (2014 Ito, E., & Walker, G. J. (2014). Similarities and differences in leisure conceptualizations between Japan and Canada and between two Japanese leisure-like terms. Leisure/Loisir, 38(1), 1–19.[Taylor & Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]) Leisure Ten Statements Test. Specifically, Euro-Canadian and Mainland Chinese undergraduate students were asked to provide 10 answers to “What is leisure/xiū xián for you?” and “What is not leisure/xiū xián for you?” An inductive coding of these lay definitions resulted in 24 categories, aligned with academic definitions (i.e., time, activity, setting, and psychological experience), suggesting the cross-cultural applicability of the leisure phenomenon. Multivariate analyses of variance identified categories that were more salient among Mainland Chinese (e.g., mass media, rest and reflection, motivation) and categories that were more salient among Euro-Canadians (e.g., emotion). The statistical results also suggested that Mainland Chinese and Euro-Canadians defined leisure/xiū xián similarly concerning some categories (e.g., relatedness and social activities, autonomy). We propose a laypeople’s definition of leisure from a cross-cultural perspective.
... Additionally, recent scholarship has addressed the etymology as well as everyday meanings of terms in non-Western languages that appear to be consonant with, or at least similar to the English word "leisure." These include xi u xi an (休閒), a Mandarin term whose meaning appears to be very similar to the English word "leisure" (Gui et al., 2021;Liu et al., 2008) and yoka and rej a in Japanese , the latter of which is derived from the English term but whose meaning has changed over time. Purrington (2014) reported that Mandarin and Persian have "more or less direct translations for leisure and closely related terms" (p. ...
... While their etymologies differ, the term xiūxi an in Mandarin and leisure in English are very similar in meaning (Liu et al., 2008;Gui et al., 2021). Likewise, the present study shows that the classical Western concept of leisure is not exclusive to Western cultures but that the ideas of hsiao yao and of leisure, while culture specific to an extent, are similar. ...
Leisure is recognized as an arena in which an individual deals with fundamental human concerns including living a good life and pursuing happiness. It is therefore not peculiar to Western culture but an interest in most, if not all, cultures and societies. However, leisure researchers have been slow in acknowledging this assumption, especially with respect to the meaning of leisure in non-Western settings. The authors argue that the Chinese concept of hsiao yao is an idea and ideal akin to the Western concept of leisure, especially in its classical sense, i.e., Greek scholé, implying “the cultivation of self” and “freedom from the necessity of being occupied.” The striking concordances between these two concepts suggests that in order to make sense of the values of leisure encountered in diverse cultures, more effort must be put forth on the cross-cultural comparative study of leisure.
... By the means of free description, participants reported daily activities in which they were engaging when each ESM survey invitation appeared. We developed a coding scheme both deductively based on the literature (e.g., Choi et al., 2017;Gui et al., 2022) and inductively based on our initial scanning of the data to capture culturally and demographically unique activities. This resulted in 41 activity codes. ...
Research on leisure and subjective well-being has focused on hedonic well-being (e.g., positive affect). Leisure’s relationships with eudaimonic well-being (e.g., meaning) remains underexplored. The literature also lacks non-Western perspectives. This study examined leisure’s relations with shiawase and ikigai, Japanese concepts that represent hedonic and eudaimonic well-being, respectively. A smartphone-based experience sampling method was used. A total of 2,207 responses were collected from 83 Japanese university students. Multilevel linear modeling showed that free time (e.g., lunch, evenings) predicted higher levels of daily shiawase and ikigai, while ikigai appeared to stay higher during afternoon. Various leisure activities positively predicted shiawase and ikigai levels, with event/ trip, eating/drinking, socializing, and hobbies being the best predictors. A few activities (e.g., exercise) differentially predicted the outcomes. Among subjective experiences common during leisure, intrinsic motivation, enjoyment, stimulation, and comfort were positively correlated to shiawase and ikigai, whereas effort predicted only ikigai.
... The English-language literature on the nature of leisure experience among the Chinese is rapidly growing. The existing research published in Western journals has focused primarily on the realm of travel among domestic and outbound Chinese travelers (e.g., Cai et al., 2008;Fong et al., 2016;Jin & Wang, 2016;Zhang, 2012;Zhong et al., 2015), definitions of leisure (Gui et al., 2019;Liu et al., 2008), the cultural and philosophical underpinnings of Chinese leisure (Gong, 1998;Liang & Walker, 2011;Ma & Liu, 2009;Schutte & Ciarlante, 1998), and leisure constraints (Dong & Chick, 2012;Zheng & Zhu, 2006). The second strand of Englishlanguage research centers on Chinese populations abroad. ...
This paper explores the associations between the perceived physical and the corresponding psychological benefits of yoga leisure. Qualitative interviews with purposeful and snowball sampling methods were conducted to elicit 29 Chinese leisure participants who engaged in yoga with at least two years of yoga participation. The results reveal that respondents’ perceived physical benefit was associated with specific psychological benefit, demonstrating the embodied experience in yoga leisure where the body and the mind are connected. Specifically, (a) Breathing regulation enhances self-focus; (b) Sensory improvements promote self-awareness; (c) Better appearance strengthens self-confidence; (d) Completion of challenging asana (i.e., body postures) boosts self-efficacy; and (e) Body control improves self-control. Theoretically, this paper contributes to our understanding of the associations between the physical benefits and the corresponding psychological benefits of yoga leisure based on the experience of Chinese yoga participants. Practical implications have also been suggested.
Except for social network and social support, little research was conducted to examine other social and community factors associated with older adults’ leisure activity participation. This research proposed three community and social factors of sense of community, trust and online social interaction and examined their relationships with leisure activity participation among older adults. It was based on a cross-sectional survey conducted in China in 2017. A total of 423 older adults completed the questionnaire. Regression analyses revealed that sense of community, trust and online social interaction were associated significantly with older adults’ overall leisure activity participation. Among eight individual categories of leisure activities, i.e. mass media, reading, social activities, outdoor activities, sports activities, spectator sports, cultural activities and hobbies, online social interaction was associated significantly with all categories except outdoor activities. Sense of community was associated significantly with all categories except cultural activities and hobbies. Trust was associated significantly with reading, cultural activities and hobbies. The findings highlight the impacts of community and social factors on older adults’ leisure activity participation. The findings also suggest different ways to enhance older adults’ leisure activity participation through promoting their sense of community, trust and online social interaction.
We used a nonrandom pretest, post-test control group experimental design to compare effects of a leisure education program, Project BHEL, involving 52 older adults (ages 71-98, M = 85) residing in three continuing care retirement communities (CCRC) in a county in Northeastern United States. The program consists of sessions with instructional video discussions and learning activities to help adults set goals associated with leisure knowledge, satisfaction, and engagement, as well as social connections and positive affect, plan to increase leisure, and problem-solve ways to overcome barriers to goal achievement. Results indicated that when compared to a control group, although participants did not show a significant increase in leisure participation, they significantly increased knowledge of leisure, maintained leisure satisfaction, and significantly increased positive affect as they decreased negative affect and trended toward decreased loneliness. Therefore, Project BHEL holds promise as an effective leisure education intervention for older adults.
The great crisis facing our age is not a tsunami of resource hungry centenarians. It is the struggle to balance freedom and belonging, winning and love, doing and being, performing and relaxing, producing and consuming. For leisure to enable the construction of agentic stories, an element of subjective freedom is essential. Instrumental leisure saps the fun and freedom, makes it consequential. The labour of being an active ager makes paid work look more appealing by comparison and can cause conflict in families. Resisting or subverting active ageing messages provides a little fun for those who prefer to be naughty, and that is good to know. Passive leisure in later life offers direct fun, sociability and connection. People that have grown up and grown old in a culture of active ageing have more freedom when they choose home-based leisure, and socialise with people of their own age
This study explores the role of yoga leisure in shaping identity of Chinese second-time mothers under the universal two-child policy. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 13 participants. The results showed that (a) Chinese second-time mothers’ maternal identity was in conflicts with their career identity and personal identity; (b) yoga leisure was positively related with Chinese second-time mothers’ identity development in four ways: affirming self, approaching self, transforming self, and balancing self; (c) with a balanced development of different aspects of life, the previous identity conflicts were largely mitigated. The study has a theoretical contribution in developing a model interpreting the role of yoga in identity development and practical implications on policy making and leisure activity programming for Chinese second-time mothers.
Although research identifies both leisure and paid work as important contributors to subjective well-being (SWB), the mechanisms by which they do so remain understudied especially in non-Western contexts. A framework relevant to both leisure and work is basic psychological need theory, which posits that satisfaction of autonomy, relatedness, and competence needs enhances SWB. Therefore, this study examined the influence of basic need satisfaction during leisure and work on domain and global life satisfaction (GLS) among Hong Kong Chinese (HKC) workers. Cross-sectional data were collected through a telephone survey from 585 randomly sampled HKC. Structural equation modeling indicated that: (a) satisfaction of autonomy, relatedness, and competence positively correlated with leisure and work domain satisfaction, except for work competence; and (b) leisure and work domain satisfaction positively and similarly related to GLS. The findings are discussed in relation to the literature on leisure, work, SWB, and culture.
Definitions of leisure and emotional experiences during leisure vary across cultures, but have been understudied. To elucidate the relationships between leisure, emotion, and culture, we adopted a cultural psychology method called situation sampling. Using an onsite survey, we collected leisure and non-leisure situations from 126 Euro-Canadian and 149 Mainland Chinese undergraduate students. Employing an online survey, we then asked another 203 Euro-Canadian and 228 Mainland Chinese undergraduate students about their interpretation of, and ideal positive affect within, randomly sampled situations. Although both groups distinguished leisure from non-leisure situations regardless of culture, results of the mixed ANOVA indicated Euro-Canadians interpreted Canadian leisure situations as leisure more highly than Mainland Chinese did. Moreover, Chinese leisure situations were more conducive to positive engaging emotions (e.g., friendly) than Canadian leisure situations, and Chinese participants idealized this kind of affect in leisure situations more than their Euro-Canadian counterparts.
We provide a critical approach to current colloquial and scholarly understandings of leisure focusing on instrumental understandings of leisure in modern, liberal-democratic society since these instrumental understandings (e.g., diversion, distinction, consumerism, and restoration for work) create confusion about the meaning of leisure. We identify that (a) emphasis on instrumental thinking prevailing in modern society moves people away from embracing leisure as an end with its inherent experiences of meaning and flourishing, and (b) to bring these elements back into leisure, we draw on post-modern, neo-Aristotelian philosophical approaches. We reject the notion of leisure as time or activity and adopt a normative approach identifying leisure as an ethical state of being characterized by authenticity, meaning, and liquidity involving learning as it intertwines with positivity. We provide an account of leisure that builds upon the idea that the good life exists through flourishing, and identify how leisure experiences promote flourishing.
In Japan, nearly half of the married couples are unable to maintain their sex life, and no one seems to change this situation successfully. On the other hand, only men have enjoyed sex as leisure by purchasing various forms of sexual service, and women have hardly had sex as leisure in any way. This chapter first delves into the causes of current difficulties in marital sex life with the methods of historical research and second analysis on the statistics and finds the gendered dual structure of sexuality in modern Japan. Next, it points that currently increasing affairs often allow sex as leisure for both men and women and argues their leisure is unintentionally transforming the gendered dual structure of sexuality into a more egalitarian one.
This introduction chapter describes the origin of this book project and the field of positive sociology of leisure (PSL), drawing on Stebbins’ works and the positive sociology movement. The chapter also defines PSL as an area of research that examines social aspects of leisure life with a focus on the optimal functioning of relationship, group, community, organization, and other social units. Moreover, PSL is connected to the extant leisure studies literature to show that there is a history of PSL-like works in the field. Yet, the chapter also points out that more focused and articulated PSL research is necessary to further advance happiness studies and leisure studies. Lastly, it provides an overview of the rest of this book’s structure.
Using a quasi-experimental pretest-post-test design without a control group we examined effects of leisure education, Project BHEL: Be Healthy and Enjoy Leisure, consisting of seven 1-hour sessions using instructional videos, discussions, and workbook activities to help older adults set goals, design a plan to increase their leisure satisfaction, and problem-solve ways to overcome barriers to goal achievement. The intervention was conducted across four locations with 89 adults (M = 74 years-old, range 58–94). Participants’ satisfaction with leisure was significantly higher post-compared to pre-intervention. There was a significant increase on knowledge of leisure assessment and, though scores remained low post-intervention, overall scores almost doubled from pre-intervention. Reported frequency of leisure participation significantly increased between pretest and follow-up. Participants consistently rated their goal achievement and their program satisfaction highly. Overall, findings indicate that Project BHEL increased engagement in, and satisfaction with aspects of leisure.
Lists of leisure activities and/or constraints used in research in non-Western settings are typically imported from studies executed in North America or Europe despite the possible influence of cultural context. To avoid this problem, we asked 182 informants from six cities in Taiwan to free list leisure constraints. While our primary purpose was to develop a culture-appropriate list of constraints for use in future research, we also illustrate how free lists can be analyzed in terms of item salience and the frequency with which groups that varied in terms of gender and age listed particular items. Results indicated that older informants listed constraints related to age and health more frequently than younger informants while younger informants were more concerned with resources, such as money. This study takes culture into account in research on leisure constraints by using an approach based on informant-provided items rather than standardized lists taken from other contexts and imposed by researchers.
Leisure is a complex topic that, at times, appears to defy logical explanation. Research that examines and compares leisure cross-culturally can provide important information to aid our understanding of the phenomenon. With an increasing need for such studies, researchers have recognised that common academic definitions of leisure may not directly translate or be usefully applied in such research. In this paper, we re-examine the concept of leisure to develop an operational definition that is applicable across cultures and ensures comparability across study results. To do this, we review and incorporate theories and research from biology, anthropology, psychology, economics and leisure studies to identify key characteristics and develop a definition of leisure. We also discuss potential methodological and theoretical implications of using the proposed definition.
The coverage of and interest in non‐Western and cross‐cultural aspects of leisure seems to be on the increase in leisure studies. Although this is a welcome trend in the current climate of multiculturalism, there is currently no systematic agenda for the anthropological study of leisure. I suggest that four issues should be addressed to serve as a foundation for an anthropology of leisure. These include (a) the ethnography of leisure, (b) the cross‐cultural validity of the concept of leisure, (c) leisure and adaptation, and (d) leisure and the evolution of culture. Although my position is scientific, materialistic, and comparative, researchers who bring other perspectives can also contribute to the cross‐cultural understanding of leisure. Most important, anthropologists must come to realize that leisure is a topic worth their attention, and leisure researchers must make use of anthropological resources and not just reprise old and erroneous beliefs about leisure and culture that have become canonical in the field.
Despite the substantial number of international students attending colleges and universities in the United States, limited efforts have been devoted to understanding their leisure behavior. The aim of this study was to identify factors related to the transnational status that affected leisure experiences of interviewed Chinese international graduate students. The theory of transnationalism, which posits that contemporary migrants maintain economic, political, social and cultural linkages to their countries of origin, was employed as the theoretical framework. The data were collected from 16 semi-structured interviews with students enrolled in one of the public universities in the Midwest. The findings revealed that the temporary residence in the U.S., coupled with a strong desire to focus on their studies abroad, were the most important factors affecting leisure of Chinese graduate students. Transnational circumstances influenced their emotional well-being, and certain legal barriers constrained their leisure.
In the context of the development of prototypic assessment instruments in the areas of cognition, personality, and adaptive functioning, the issues of standardization, norming procedures, and the important psychometrics of test reliability and validity are evaluated critically. Criteria, guidelines, and simple rules of thumb are provided to assist the clinician faced with the challenge of choosing an appropriate test instrument for a given psychological assessment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
A second-order meta-analysis was conducted to assess the implications of using college student subjects in social science research. Four meta-analyses investigating response homogeneity (cumulative N > 650,000) and 30 meta-analyses reporting effect sizes for 65 behavioral or psychological relationships (cumulative N > 350,000) provided comparative data for college student subjects and nonstudent (adult) subjects for the present research. In general, responses of college student subjects were found to be slightly more homogeneous than those of nonstudent subjects. Moreover, effect sizes derived from college student subjects frequently differed from those derived from nonstudent subjects both directionally and in magnitude. Because there was no systematic pattern to the differences observed, caution must be exercised when attempting to extend any relationship found using college student subjects to a nonstudent (adult) population. The results augur in favor of, and emphasize the importance of, replicating research based on college student subjects with nonstudent subjects before attempting any generalizations. Copyright 2001 by the University of Chicago.
Most inter-rater reliability studies using nominal scales suggest the existence of two populations of inference: the population
of subjects (collection of objects or persons to be rated) and that of raters. Consequently, the sampling variance of the
inter-rater reliability coefficient can be seen as a result of the combined effect of the sampling of subjects and raters.
However, all inter-rater reliability variance estimators proposed in the literature only account for the subject sampling
variability, ignoring the extra sampling variance due to the sampling of raters, even though the latter may be the biggest
of the variance components. Such variance estimators make statistical inference possible only to the subject universe. This
paper proposes variance estimators that will make it possible to infer to both universes of subjects and raters. The consistency
of these variance estimators is proved as well as their validity for confidence interval construction. These results are applicable
only to fully crossed designs where each rater must rate each subject. A small Monte Carlo simulation study is presented to
demonstrate the accuracy of large-sample approximations on reasonably small samples.
Pi (pi) and kappa (kappa) statistics are widely used in the areas of psychiatry and psychological testing to compute the extent of agreement between raters on nominally scaled data. It is a fact that these coefficients occasionally yield unexpected results in situations known as the paradoxes of kappa. This paper explores the origin of these limitations, and introduces an alternative and more stable agreement coefficient referred to as the AC1 coefficient. Also proposed are new variance estimators for the multiple-rater generalized pi and AC1 statistics, whose validity does not depend upon the hypothesis of independence between raters. This is an improvement over existing alternative variances, which depend on the independence assumption. A Monte-Carlo simulation study demonstrates the validity of these variance estimators for confidence interval construction, and confirms the value of AC1 as an improved alternative to existing inter-rater reliability statistics.
This conceptual paper summarizes the current research-based knowledge about the role of leisure in meaning-making. The key themes of leisure-induced meaning-making include: (1) identity (personal and collective), (2) creativity (e.g. self-expression through creative leisure), (3) connectedness (socially, spiritually, and culturally; e.g. connections with people, religion, nature, and culture), (4) harmony/balance, (5) stress-coping and healing, (6) growth/transformation (e.g. resilience, empowerment), and (7) experiential and existential aspects of leisure (e.g. “flow” activities). Human’s inspiration for an engaged life is seen as an overarching theme to broadly capture these functions. Specifically, a meaningful engagement with one’s life seems to be achieved by maintaining: (1) a joyful life, (2) a composed life (e.g. making one’s life more focused, collected, and/or in control), (3) a connected life (e.g. socially, spiritually, culturally), (4) a discovered life (e.g. self-identity, self-discovery), and (5) a hopeful and empowered life (e.g. showing a sense of strength). Importantly, research has shown that leisure can promote all of those elements of a meaningful engagement with life, suggesting that there seem to be connections among leisure, meaning-making, and engagement. Accordingly, the paper describes implications of using a meaning-focused leisure practice from an applied perspective.
Accumulated cross-cultural research indicates that North Americans typically emphasize primary control (e.g., changing the environment) and high-arousal positive affect (e.g., enthusiasm), whereas East Asians typically emphasize secondary control (e.g., adjusting oneself, accepting the environment) and low-arousal positive affect (e.g., calmness). Therefore, the purpose of this exploratory experience sampling method study was to examine cultural similarities and differences in Japanese (n = 41) and Euro-Canadian (n = 15) undergraduate students' control and positive affect as leisure experience. Results indicated that during leisure versus non-leisure participation, (a) both Japanese and Euro-Canadians experienced primary control and high-arousal positive affect more and secondary control (acceptance) less, and (b) Japanese alone experienced secondary control (adjustment) and low-arousal positive affect more. This cross-cultural study contributes to the leisure studies field, both theoretically and practically, by identifying cultural commonality and specificity in leisure experiences as well as leisure's potential role in enhancing psychological well-being.
This study empirically tests Walker, Deng, and Dieser's (2005) proposition that ethnicity affects which factors most facilitate people's feelings of intrinsic motivation during leisure; and it extends their work by also examining the effect of gender on these facilitators. A trilingual telephone survey asked Chinese/Canadian (N = 298) and British/Canadian (N = 321) participants to identify a leisure activity they found interesting and enjoyable (i.e., intrinsically motivated) when they were with a close friend. Participants then reported how they perceived varying six facilitators - autonomy/personal choice, autonomy/ mutual choice, relatedness, competence, effort, and role fulfillment - would affect their intrinsic motivation during this leisure situation. Statistical analyses indicated that five of the six facilitators differed by ethnicity, or gender, or both. Study findings are discussed, and theoretical and practical implications are described.
This study reviewed non-Western and cross-cultural/national research published in five major leisure studies journals between 1990 and 2009. Of 1,891 total articles, 4.1% were non-Western and cross-cultural/national in nature. Overall: (a) Greater China was the most frequently studied culture/nation (24.4%); (b) survey research was the most often employed method (33.8%); (c) (b) perceived benefits, motivations, and leisure meanings was the most common theme (14.1%); and (d) although articles on this topic increased fivefold over 20 years, over 90% of recent leisure articles still focused, in whole or in part, on only slightly more than 10% of the world's population. Culture/nation, methodological, and thematic differences across the five journals are described and implications for leisure theory and practice are outlined.
This study investigated similarities and differences in leisure conceptualizations between Japan and Canada and between two Japanese leisure-like terms: yoka and rejā. To address these purposes, we developed the Leisure Ten Statements Test (LTST). The LTST asks people to provide 10 open-ended responses to a prompt (e.g., “Leisure _____”). Responses from university students in Japan and Canada were classified, and then statistical analyses were conducted on the proportions of the 26 resulting categories. Results indicated that: (1) leisure conceptualizations differed not only between Japan and Canada but also within Japan depending on terminologies; (2) the loanword rejā has different meanings from its original English word, leisure, suggesting that it has adapted Japanese cultural contexts; and (3) the Japanese leisure-like term that best compares with the English word leisure varies depending on which specific aspect of leisure is of interest.Cette étude examine les similitudes et les différences entre la conceptualisation de loisirs japonais et canadien et entre deux termes de loisirs japonais yoka and rejā. Pour répondre à ces besoins, nous avons développé un test sur les dix déclarations de loisir (DDL). Le DDL demande aux gens de fournir 10 réponses ouvertes à une déclaration générale (par exemple, «Les loisirs sont _____ »). Des réponses obtenues d’étudiants universitaires Japonais et Canadien ont été analysées. Les résultats démontrent que : (a) la conceptualisation de loisirs diffère non seulement entre le Japon et le Canada, mais aussi au Japon par fonction terminologique; (b) rejā, est un terme modifié des loisirs, ce qui suggère qu'il a adapté aux contextes culturels japonais; et (c) tandis que le terme rejā convient mieux avec le mot loisirs, ce terme japonais varie en fonction spécifique des loisirs.
The child in contemporary urban China is experiencing an increasingly exclusive focus on academic achievement at the expense of non-academic activities, particularly housework. In-depth interviews with caregivers (including grandparents and parents) from 9 three-generational families (n = 34) and parents from 10 nuclear families (n = 20) were conducted. Results show that although children from both family types were low in housework participation, children in three-generational families were perceived by their caregivers to be less competent in performing self-care and family-care tasks. They were also less frequently assigned regular tasks as compared with children from nuclear families. Unlike caregivers from western societies, where children's participation in housework is seen as either a means of socialisation or a source of domestic labour, Chinese caregivers consider housework as a distraction, at best an addendum to academic work.
A body of scholarship about the meaning of leisure has existed for over 50 years. Although the contemporary notion of leisure grew out of the modern industrial age, the definitions and meanings have continued to expand. This paper addresses historical and evolutionary contexts of leisure from one author’s perspective. Five categories of meanings are addressed including leisure as time, recreation/activity, state of mind, places and spaces, and cultural context. From a postmodern or both/and perspective, these five illustrative perspectives show how leisure has many meanings that continue to emerge. Examining leisure from a variety of perspectives is both a strength and a weakness for future scholarship. This paper challenges leisure scholars to consider the numerous possibilities for addressing expanded leisure meanings into the future.
If leisure is seen as a significant aspect of the overall quality of life, it is important to develop a technique for measuring leisure which takes into account the essential subjective nature of the leisure experience. In this paper data are presented which illustrate the problems associated with activity-type operational definitions of leisure. Such definitions are seen to ignore individual and situational differences and to assume that leisure can be measured objectively. An alternative technique for defining and measuring leisure is proposed based on empirical research which shows perceived freedom of choice, enjoyment and other perceptual dimensions to be closely associated with the leisure experience. This proposed technique requires further testing on different population groups, but it potentially represents a method of measuring leisure which is both reliable and valid.
Purpose:
The Bonferroni correction adjusts probability (p) values because of the increased risk of a type I error when making multiple statistical tests. The routine use of this test has been criticised as deleterious to sound statistical judgment, testing the wrong hypothesis, and reducing the chance of a type I error but at the expense of a type II error; yet it remains popular in ophthalmic research. The purpose of this article was to survey the use of the Bonferroni correction in research articles published in three optometric journals, viz. Ophthalmic & Physiological Optics, Optometry & Vision Science, and Clinical & Experimental Optometry, and to provide advice to authors contemplating multiple testing.
Recent findings:
Some authors ignored the problem of multiple testing while others used the method uncritically with no rationale or discussion. A variety of methods of correcting p values were employed, the Bonferroni method being the single most popular. Bonferroni was used in a variety of circumstances, most commonly to correct the experiment-wise error rate when using multiple 't' tests or as a post-hoc procedure to correct the family-wise error rate following analysis of variance (anova). Some studies quoted adjusted p values incorrectly or gave an erroneous rationale.
Summary:
Whether or not to use the Bonferroni correction depends on the circumstances of the study. It should not be used routinely and should be considered if: (1) a single test of the 'universal null hypothesis' (Ho ) that all tests are not significant is required, (2) it is imperative to avoid a type I error, and (3) a large number of tests are carried out without preplanned hypotheses.
The purpose of this study is to describe leisure constraints as perceived by residents of the Chinese cities Beijing, Shanghai, Hangzhou, Qingdao, Chengdu, and Shenzhen. Rather than relying on lists of leisure constraints developed in other contexts, we used the common ethnographic technique of free listing, which allows informants to indicate what they perceive as constraints on their leisure. A second sample of informants rated the importance of 37 constraints determined through the free listing procedure. Constraints in these cities can be categorized, based on their perceived importance, into eight distinct types. These relate to several demographic and sociographic variables.
This research investigated the issue of the weighting and number of Twenty Statements Test (TST) responses with samples of 165 Hong Kong secondary school pupils and 100 Swedish and 100 Ethiopian university students. Responses were classified into idiocentric, large group, small group, and allocentric categories, and scores were weighted by the rank order of the response and 7, 10, or 20 items were considered. Analysis found that the rank and number of the items made a difference to the proportions assigned to these categories for the Hong Kong but not the other samples and made little difference to the testing of hypotheses about gender and cultural differences in self-conceptions.
The purpose of this study was to ascertain the validity of popular definitions of recreation and leisure. High school students volunteered to participate in the study. Subjects were randomly assigned to one of four possible stimulus word by response method groups. Subjects responded to either ‘recreation’ or ‘leisure’ using a production method or a sit and think method. Findings revealed that subjects defined ‘leisure’ as pleasure (and related terms) and specific passive activities. Like ‘leisure’, ‘recreation’ was defined by pleasure (and related terms), but the specific terms used to define ‘recreation’ were often active sports.
The need for definitional consistency is becoming increasingly evident for leisure research. Based on an integrative review of the literature, three primary terms are explored in this essay: time, recreation, and leisure. Work, as a related concept, is also considered but not as extensively. Psychologically perceived free time is offered as a context in which most people tend to be most likely to engage in recreational activities and to experience leisure. Recreation is proposed as the personally meaningful activity itself as well as the behavior associated with the activity. Following Neulinger's (1974, 1981, 1984) conceptualization, leisure is presented as a self enhancing affective state that is most probably, but not always, achieved through engaging in recreation (personally meaningful activities). Attention to the leisure‐self relationship is suggested as an avenue of research. Clarifying the meaning of terms is not merely a semantic exercise, but is an essential part of the scholarly study of leisure.
Twenty-six Malaysian (Collectivist), 32 Australian, and 20 British (Individualist) subjects completed ten statements beginning with "I am." The responses were coded according to whether they were idiocentric, group, or allocentric self-references. The scores were then weighted according to the rank order in which they appeared on the questionnaire. As predicted by Hofstede's model, people from the collectivist culture produced significantly more group and fewer idiocentric self-descriptions than did people from the individualist cultures. The data support a pan-cultural model of the self in which cross-cultural variations in the self-concept are not treated as categorically different, but as reflecting the relative salience of the self's constituent components.
The objective of this exploratory study was to examine if, in Chinese culture, there is a phenomenon comparable with the Western concept of leisure as a subjective experience. A literature review identified a number of properties that are often associated with leisure as a subjective experience and related types of experiences (e.g., flow, absorption). Using an informed etic approach, these properties were compared with those occurring during experiences described by 40 Chinese study participants as being rùmí (i.e., interesting, absorbing). Results suggest that the Chinese experience of rùmí is comparable with the Western concept of leisure as a subjective experience, although post experientia differences do exist. Suppositions concerning what this finding may mean for leisure studies are provided and future research recommendations are discussed.
A free eprint of this article is available: https://www.tandfonline.com/eprint/CkraVXsg44jJ3aRTtQ9K/full
The purposes of this research were to determine if agreement exists among leisure services practitioners regarding the meaning of leisure and to examine how they describe themselves and the body of knowledge related to leisure services. In addition, these responses were compared with a group of individuals outside the field to determine if these practitioners possess a unique understanding of leisure, leisure practitioners, and the body of knowledge. Members of the Recreation Branch of the Ohio Parks and Recreation Association (n = 108) and a purposive sample of employees of two local adoption agencies (n = 30) completed questionnaires, including a True/False section, a three-part free-list component, and demographic information. Data were analyzed according to consensus modeling theory using Anthropac™ data analysis software and SPSS™. The True/False data indicated high agreement, and thus, “culturally correct” definitions of leisure for each group that support traditional and multidimensional definitions of leisure. When analyzed along with the free-list data, the most frequently reported dimensions of leisure paralleled traditional definitions (i.e., free time, activities). The responses of both groups indicate that professionals need to know about management and activities. Implications of these findings are discussed in relation to models of service provision.
One of the ongoing problems surrounding the whole area of leisure studies concerns conceptualization of the term leisure itself. Few empirical studies to date have looked at the meaning of leisure, and even fewer have incorporated a grounded theory approach.Using a symbolic interactionist framework, the present study employed a time‐diary technique combined with in‐depth interviews to explore perceptions of leisure situations among a random sample of married couples. The results showed that although leisure could be experienced during almost any type of activity, there was considerable consensus with regard to the perceptual factors associated with leisure situations. The factors shown to best differentiate leisure from non‐leisure were enjoyment, freedom of choice, relaxation, intrinsic motivation, and the lack of evaluation. None of these factors alone can be equated with the concept of leisure, but the combination of three or more factors leads to accurate predictions of the definition of situations as leisure.
This study examined the meaning of leisure for Chinese/Canadians. Participants (N = 35) completed a diary seven times a day for 12 days when a randomly scheduled watch alarm rang. Participants indicated what activity they were doing, whether it was work, leisure, both, or neither, and their motivations for and needs fulfilled by the activity. Participants primarily engaged in passive leisure activities, researchers and participants often differed in whether they deemed the activity leisure, and participants differentiated between leisure and non-leisure in terms of high intrinsic motivation, low effort, and low introjected reward motivation. In contrast with most Western research, perceived freedom was not an important distinguishing factor. A cross-cultural leisure meaning framework was developed to explain these findings.
Increasingly, place is being considered in the leisure studies literature as an important contextual factor influencing behaviour, shaping perceptions, and defining experiences. Such considerations, however, have largely neglected the literature in humanistic geography where many of the basic definitions, perspectives, and issues concerning place are rooted and continue to be debated. In this paper, some classic sources, in particular Relph (1976), as well as some contemporary contributions are briefly described to uncover where many of the perspectives on place have emerged and evolved. In addition, some cautionary notes are offered to remind leisure researchers that continuing to romanticize place will fail to acknowledge its negative implications for many groups, especially those who are marginalized by place. Finally, some observations are offered on where we, as leisure researchers, might take our inquiries in an effort to understand the impact of place.
Describes various approaches to the study, measurement, and interpretation of leisure. Topics include a history of the concept of leisure, various research methodologies (e.g., time-budget studies and typological evaluations), the role of sex, age, socioeconomic, and religious variables in leisure, the formation of leisure attitudes, and the new leisure ethic. (141/2 p ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Chinese ways of dealing with seeming contradictions result in a dialectical or compromise approach—retaining basic elements of opposing perspectives by seeking a "middle way." On the other hand, European–American ways, deriving from a lay version of Aristotelian logic, result in a differentiation model that polarized contradictory perspectives in an effort to determine which factor is position is correct. Five empirical studies showed that dialectical thinking is a form of folk wisdom in Chinese culture: Chinese participants preferred dialectical proverbs containing seeming contradictions more than did American participants. Chinese participants also preferred dialectical resolutions to social conflicts and preferred dialectical arguments over classical Western logical arguments. Furthermore, when 2 apparently contradictory propositions were presented, American participants polarized their views, and Chinese participants were moderately accepting of of both propositions. Origins of these cultural differences and their implications for human reasoning in general are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Most research focuses on actual affect, or the affective states that people actually feel. In this article, I demonstrate the importance and utility of studying ideal affect, or the affective states that people ideally want to feel. First, I define ideal affect and describe the cultural causes and behavioral consequences of ideal affect. To illustrate these points, I compare American and East Asian cultures, which differ in their valuation of high-arousal positive affective states (e.g., excitement, enthusiasm) and low-arousal positive affective states (e.g., calm, peace-fulness). I then introduce affect valuation theory, which integrates ideal affect with current models of affect and emotion and, in doing so, provides a new framework for understanding how cultural and temperamental factors may shape affect and behavior.
© 2007 Association for Psychological Science.
In 3 experiments, the authors investigated how strategic inclinations associated with promotion versus prevention orientations--that is, eager approach versus vigilant avoidance, respectively--affect the use of language. It is hypothesized that eager promotion strategies used to attain desired end states entail using more abstract language than used with vigilant prevention strategies. This is shown to hold for experimentally induced relationship goals (Experiment 1) and communication goals (Experiment 2). In the 3rd experiment, the authors examined the impact of abstractly and concretely worded messages upon the behavioral intentions of chronically prevention- and promotion-oriented individuals and found support for the hypothesis that behavioral intentions to engage in specific activities are stronger when there is a fit between message wording and chronic orientation than when there is no fit. The broader implications of these findings are discussed.
Time as a constraint to leisure
- G Godbey
Godbey, G. (2005). Time as a constraint to leisure. In E. L. Jackson (Ed.), Constraints to leisure
(pp. 185-200). State College, PA: Venture Publishing.