Do-it-Yourself Activities and Subjective Well-Being

Abstract

We examined predictors of subjective well-being (SWB) associated with do-it-yourself (DIY) activities in a sample of 525 self-identified DIYers through Amazon's Mechanical Turk. We hypothesized that positive mood, feeling energized or aroused, and experiencing flow during DIY activities, would each contribute to subjective wellbeing (SWB), and, that negative self-focus would not. We also controlled for individual differences that could affect the experience of negative self-focus and flow: quiet ego and depression/anxiety. Overall, participants identified most with DIY activities that involved aesthetics, repair, upkeep and maintenance, and landscape or gardening, and construction; they reported these activities were challenging and utilized their skills. Using structural equation modeling, we examined our hypothesized model and two alternate models. Our amended hypothesized model accounted for 61% of the variance in SWB. Positive mood/arousal was positively associated with SWB. Quiet ego facilitated SWB, both directly and indirectly through the positive mood/high arousal pathway. Depressed and anxious mood was negatively associated with flow during DIY activities and SWB; it was also positively correlated with excessive self-focus during DIY activities. Our results lend credence to the idea that DIY activities that induce positive mood and high arousal may benefit SWB. Having a strong quiet ego identity may enhance the benefits associated with DIY activities. Our study contributes to the literature by describing the mechanisms responsible for how DIY activities promote SWB, as well as by explaining the factors that optimize the impact of these experiences.

Enhancing and explaining art-making for mood-repair: The benefits of positive growth-oriented instructions and quiet ego contemplation.

“…This measure was completed at T1 only. Student scores on the QES ( M = 5.16, SD = 0.63) were comparable to previously published studies (Collier & Wayment, 2018; Collier et al, 2019).…”

“…Finally, when controlling for the effects of treatments on positive mood, we found there was uniform and strong flow and arousal across all intervention conditions. Previous studies with retrospective and cross-sectional samples of artists (Collier & von Károlyi, 2014), Makers (Collier & Wayment, 2018), and DIYers (Collier et al, 2019) have reported that both arousal and flow were critical for rejuvenation and subjective well-being to occur.…”

“…Finally, at the end of the art-making tasks (T3), participants were asked additional questions about their mood (besides the pleasant mood at T3 question) to determine how “rejuvenated” they felt: how refreshed, restored, and revitalized they felt; as well as how positive their mood was (Collier & von Károlyi, 2014; Collier et al, 2016; Collier et al, 2019). Both questions used a 5-point Likert-type scale, from 1 = none to 5 = almost all of the time .…”

“…This balanced sense of self is associated with less judgment of self and others (Wayment, West, & Craddock, 2016) as well as improved physiological markers of well-being (Collier et al, 2016;Wayment, Collier, Birkett, Traustadóttir, & Till, 2015). Previous research has also demonstrated that the quiet ego characteristics are positively associated with a "maker" identity (Collier & Wayment, 2018) and positively associated with flow and well-being in the context of art-making activity (Collier & Wayment, 2018;Collier, Wayment, & Wolf, 2019). In the current study, we wanted to create experimental conditions that either reduced self-focus and rumination, or, exacerbated it.…”

Making Versus Viewing Art: Effects on Affect, Enjoyment, and Flow

“…Tasks with optimal levels of challenge and skill level can lead to states of flow where an individual is engaged and absorbed in an activity for its own sake rather than for any extrinsic reason (Csikszentmihalyi, 2008;Csikszentmihalyi & Csikszentmihalyi, 2000). Previous research has found a positive association between flow and both positive affect (Collins et al, 2009) and life satisfaction (Sahoo & Sahu, 2009); and a negative association between flow and negative affect (Collins et al, 2009) and a depressed or anxious mood (Collier et al, 2020). Engaging in flow-inducing activities has been shown to improve positive affect.…”