Shaping tourists’ wellbeing through guided slow adventures

Abstract

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.

Tourist Experiences Recommender System Based on Emotion Recognition with Wearable Data

“…The following categories of TE [ 53 , 54 , 55 ] were established: Adventure: defines experiences of risky activities such as scuba diving, waterskiing, horse riding, and canoeing. Ecological: relates experiences of contact with nature such as hiking, ecological walks, and bicycle tours.…”

The social crisis aftermath: tourist well-being during the COVID-19 outbreak

“…Perceived well-being is defined as an "assessment of satisfaction with the quality of their life (QOL) as a whole and/or the quality of aspects or domains of life" (McCabe & Johnson, 2013, p. 44). In a context of leisure travel, tourists resort to vacations for health and wellness benefits (Buckley, 2020;Farki c et al, 2020;Hanna et al, 2019), in which wellness has been referred to as an "optimistic assessment of their lives including contentment, positive emotion, engagement and purpose" (Pyke et al, 2016, p. 94). Tourists' traversal of a foreign place and encounter of hospitality services often renders mental and fatigue restoration potential that ultimately enhances their temporal well-being (Rosenbaum & Wong, 2015).…”

“…Tourists' holiday travel away from their domicile is meant to provide them with restorative experiences that fulfill their needs for vigor, rejuvenation, social connection, and ultimately, improved well-being Hanna et al, 2019;Uysal et al, 2016). Academics and industry practitioners have long been advocating sustainable tourism practices that promote positive psychology and mental health (Buckley, 2020;Farki c et al, 2020). Travel therefore should have been a breath for the soul to instill "a sense of optimism, self-esteem, resilience, vitality, selfdetermination or positive relationships" (Coghlan, 2015, p. 384).…”

Empowering destinations after-COVID. Boosting confidence through the SDGs application and the ‘glocal’ development

“…Regarding 'sdG3-Good health and wellbeing' and the related 'sdG6-Clean water sanitation', any related planification will contribute to positive tourism, by revealing how mindful and eudaimonic visitor experiences are organised by adventure tour guides in natural settings (Farkić et al, 2020).…”