The impact of marital and family roles on outdoor recreation throughout the life course
Abstract
The family's impact on leisure behavior has historically been examined in the context of the family life cycle. Today, however, marriage and childbearing are commonly delayed, more and more childless couples exist, single women head households with children and in general both men and women live longer. These changing demographics have caused the traditional developmental pattern of family life to shift and reorder. Leisure research, however, has not kept pace with these changes. This research examines the family within the context of life course development. Life course development concepts are used to further define the family as an independent variable. Additionally, this research looks at marital status throughout the life course to further investigate how family roles influence leisure behavior. Birdwatching, camping, fishing, and camping/fishing were each examined using logistic regression to determine if individual family roles and marital status influence participation in outdoor recreation. Results indicate that participation in outdoor recreation varies across the life course and that children both serve as leisure opportunities and constraints. Significant results suggest that married women with children are less likely to participate in outdoor recreation than married women without children. Analysis of both the life course of men and women with spouses emphasized the importance of leisure partners throughout life. Additionally, results provide the first evidence that birdwatching does vary across the life course and, in particular, children serve as catalysts. It is concluded that individual roles and marital status influence outdoor recreation behavior and that further research should examine how participation might change across the life course when the leisure social group is examined. Marital and family roles are discussed as factors that influence both leisure opportunity and constraint. In particular, women's roles and the absence of fathers are discussed as constraints, and the concept of a developmental window of leisure socialization is proposed. Further discussion examines how results might vary if resource-based activities were compared to other leisure and recreation activities such as arts activities or social events.
Degree
Ph.D.
Advisors
O'Leary, Purdue University.
Subject Area
Recreation|Forestry|Families & family life|Personal relationships|Sociology
Off-Campus Purdue Users:
To access this dissertation, please log in to our
proxy server.