This article investigates the transformative impacts of regular nature-based adventure activity engagement and its long-lasting effects on eudaimonic well-being (EWB), specifically mental health. Although extant research highlights a wide range of well-being and mental health benefits from participation in such pursuits, less is known about experienced outdoor adventure enthusiasts for whom adventure is a fundamental and transformational part of their lives. The study builds on an existing conceptual framework that synthesizes pertinent research concepts on nature-based activity engagement and subjective well-being benefits. It presents key findings from 40 semi-structured in-depth online interviews with respondents from the UK, Germany, and Serbia. Interview data were collated and analyzed using a thematic framework approach. The findings highlight the importance of outdoor adventure activity engagement for respondents’ mental and physical health and long-term well-being. Regular activity participation can be transformational in reducing feelings of ill-being and enhancing EWB. It can improve self-efficacy and identity development and promote the fulfilment of psychological needs, facilitated by key transformational catalyzers. Continually entering a liminal state, experiencing emotions, and overcoming challenges and risks during engagement are crucial to “successful” long-lasting transformation. Further research should continue to explore adventure’s transformational and EWB benefits to develop long-term data.
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This is a composite article which brings together the international perspectives of the editorial board of the Journal of Adventure Education and Outdoor Learning to explore the impacts of artificial intelligence (AI) on the field of adventure education and outdoor learning (AE/OL). Building on the AE/OL profession’s response to the impacts of COVID-19 on outdoor and environmental education in 2020, this article includes authors from 10 countries including Australia, Brazil, Canada, England, Japan, Kenya, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, and Wales. The statements discuss the impacts and opportunities of AI for the AE/OL professions, researchers, the nature of being in and with the outdoors, and Indigenous knowledges. The intention of this article is not to present a definitive summary of the state of the profession, but to provide examples of the ways in which diverse people are responding to the challenges and opportunities of AI. By sharing these views, and identifying some commonalities, we hope that AE/OL educators, practitioners, researchers and managers can creatively and cautiously seize the opportunities of this technological revolution.
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Methodological challenges are rarely discussed in depth among outdoor adventure tourism scholars. Despite the prevailing qualitative approaches in this field, and the recognition that the fleetingness of the human experience and the non-linearity and unpredictability of the more-than-human world have the power to influence the research process, the messy, negotiated and often contested researcher’s role has been less considered. In addressing this, the aim here is to critically discuss the methodological approach to explorations of the outdoor experiences through deconstructing the researcher’s role. Through renderings of the existentialist propositions of being in the world and a poststructuralist philosophy of fluidity and flux, the attention is granted to embodied experiences as a way of generating knowledges. Being situated in the research setting, space is created for interrogation of the processual dimensions of commodified outdoor journeys from an emic, researcher-as-tourist perspective. Research in the outdoor scenaria is by no means a linear process but rather a messy, complex and often ruptured journey, further complicated by the ethical concerns, struggles and idiosyncrasies of the researcher. I thus discuss the nuances and complexities of doing the embodied research and the haphazard ways of data collection. In shifting attention to more existential aspects of being in the outdoors through the process of post-experiential reflections, discomfort emerged as a critical quality of the outdoor experience. I thus illuminate the significance of embodied research and epiphenomenal discoveries in the production of new knowledges, to which greater attention, both in theoretical and methodological conversations, should be paid in the future.
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We contribute to the hospitality work research agenda by reconsidering the role of outdoor adventure guides as agents of hospitality, set against a conceptual backdrop of deepening ontological insecurity in industrialized societies. We argue that the concepts of dwelling, communitas and hygge have much to offer in the delivery of outdoor hospitality in general, and in outdoor adventure tourism scenarios in particular. Although originating from the Danes and their ideas of 'cosy indoor life', the concept of hygge has recently gained global attention in the debates around creating comfortable atmospheres at home, and in fostering people's emotional well-being on holiday. Moving the concept along, we suggest the stimulation of hygge in the outdoors, along with provision of the space to dwell and the stage management of the communal effervescence of communitas as part of the crucial skill set for the outdoor guide. We opine that such conceptualization can greatly inform our understanding of both the role of the outdoor guide and of the dynamics of deliverable hospitable experience more generally.
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Against the backdrop of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal 3, good health and wellbeing, this paper reports on a study that examined how outdoor guides perceive their role in facilitating the psychological wellbeing of tourists who consume slow adventure experiences. These experiences, such as canoeing, stargazing or foraging, are characterised by a slower passage of time, immersion in the natural world and a sense of belonging to small social groups. Grounded in research on wellbeing from a positive psychology perspective, the study utilised semi-structured, in-depth, interviews with ten outdoor adventure guides in the Scottish Highlands and Islands. Following a hermeneutic interpretive approach to analyse the interview transcripts, the findings revealed how perceptions of time, meaningful moments and a sense of togetherness are choreographed by slow adventure guides to shape tourists’ psychological wellbeing through immersive guided experiences, ultimately helping tourists to re-establish a much-yearned-for connection with nature. The study adds to tourism, wellbeing and sustainability literature by providing new perspectives on psychological wellbeing through guided slow adventures. In particular the findings contribute to positive tourism, or tourism and positive psychology field of research, by revealing how mindful and eudaimonic visitor experiences are organised by adventure tour guides in natural settings.
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The necessity for humans inhabiting the 21st century to slow down and take time to carry out daily practices frames the discourse of this research note. We suggest reconceptualising tourist wellbeing through the concept of slow adventure, as a response to the cult of speed and as a vehicle for engaging in deep, immersive and more meaningful experiences during journeys in the outdoors. We suggest that slow adventure has the potential to improve people’s general health and wellbeing through mindful enjoyment and consumption of the outdoor experience and thus bring people back to a state of mental and physical equilibrium. In so doing, we argue that extending the concept to include discussions around the psychological and social aspects of slow adventure is needed.
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This study, through the concept of biophilia, examines how we can restore a ‘love of life’ in a world often characterised by rationalisation, destruction and alienation from self and nature. Specifically, we observe how outdoor adventures during travels might contribute to the development of biophilic feelings. To this end, we employed a hermeneutic phenomenological approach to analyse the narratives from nine participants in the UK, Germany and Serbia. The findings suggest that adventure activities in the outdoors foster the development of meaningful relationships with the self, other humans and non-human nature, all contributing to the enhancement of eudaimonic wellbeing. The study adds to the tourism literature by arguing that more biophilic and ecological approaches, hitherto underutilised in studying the benefits of tourism from a positive psychology perspective, might serve as a lens through which to explore meaningful social transformation in times of polycrises.
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Ruim tweehonderd basisschoolleerlingen tekenden een kaart van een plek in hun directe omgeving die ze belangrijk vinden (zie Geografie november/december). Met veertien kinderen gingen we daarover in gesprek. Ook liepen alle leerlingen in groepjes door de buurt, maakten foto’s en deden suggesties voor verbeteringen. Stap 2 in een onderzoek om ze met meer kennis, kunde en gevoel van verantwoordelijkheid te betrekken bij de eigen omgeving.
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For twenty years, typical outdoor lifestyle sports like rafting, snowboarding and rock climbing, which used to be exclusively practised in natural environments, are being offered in controlled artificial settings. This process can be described as 'the indoorisation of outdoor sports'. With this development, questions of authenticity arise. Are these new, commercial forms still authentic lifestyle sports? And can we consider the participants in these indoorised lifestyle sports as authentic? There has been a discussion about authenticity in lifestyle sports since its worldwide popularisation and it is worth to reconsider this discussion against the background of new, commercial versions of lifestyle sports. Therefore, in this paper a qualitative analysis is offered about the consumption of a constructed authenticity in a cultural context increasingly characterized by artificialization.
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Over the last ten years there has been growing interest in the judgement and decision making (JDM) of outdoor professionals, though research to date has focused on the JDM processes of experts. In contrast, this study examined the JDM of less experienced, competent, but fully qualified outdoor instructors (N = 9) and the development of their JDM skills. Using semi-structured interviews and thematic analysis, we identified two overarching themes: Firstly, managing the cognitive load (relating to instructor JDM), and secondly social experiential learning (relating to instructor JDM development). We found these outdoor instructors needed to manage complex situational demands and high cognitive loads, while balancing the safety of their group with the development of their own JDM. We propose that a combination of challenging formative experiences, community of practice interactions, and explicit development of metacognition are essential to outdoor instructors JDM development. Implications for training, and future research are discussed.
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