The effect of vacation on travelers' subjective well-being
Abstract
Despite the importance of travel and vacation to enhance people's subjective well-being and the substantial amount of research about subjective well-being in recent decades, limited efforts have been devoted to understanding the effect of vacation on travelers' subjective well-being. In addition, vacation duration and frequency, two critical travel characteristics in shaping subjective well-being status, have not been addressed fully. Based on the theoretical foundation of subjective well-being and theories of happiness, the current study proposed a conceptual model of effect of vacation on travelers' subjective well-being. It also conducted a longitudinal quasi-experiment within the context of China to investigate the effect of vacation on different dimensions of subjective well-being as well as the effect of vacation frequency and duration on travelers' subjective well-being. The study shows that while travelers' chronic subjective well-being did not change after vacation, their occasion-specific subjective well-being shows a pattern where their sense of well-being was boosted immediately after the vacation and faded out after three months. While longer vacation improved travelers' affect more intensively, more frequency vacations mitigate the fadeout of global life satisfaction and contentment with specific life domains. The present research investigates vacation and subjective well-being by delineating the variable and stable components of subjective well-being within the tourism context. It also represents one of the first attempts to incorporate both vacation duration and frequency by examining vacation's effect on subjective well-being. This study bears important implications for public policy initiative, travel/tourism managers, and individual choices.
Degree
Ph.D.
Advisors
Cai, Purdue University.
Subject Area
Marketing|Social psychology|Recreation
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