Worth the Wait? Leisure Can Be Just as Enjoyable With Work Left Undone

Abstract

Four studies reveal that (a) people hold a robust intuition about the order of work and leisure and that (b) this intuition is sometimes mistaken. People prefer saving leisure for last, believing they would otherwise be distracted by looming work (Study 1). In controlled experiments, however, although subjects thought their enjoyment would be spoiled when they played a game before rather than after a laborious problem-solving task, got a massage before rather than after midterms, and consumed snacks and watched videos before rather than after a stressful performance, in reality these experiences were similarly enjoyable regardless of order (Studies 2 through 4). This misprediction was indeed mediated by anticipated distraction and was therefore attenuated after people were reminded of the absorbing nature of enjoyable activities (Studies 3 and 4). These studies highlight the power of hedonic experience within the moment of consumption, which has implications for managing (or mismanaging) everyday work and leisure. People might postpone leisure and overwork for future rewards that could be just as pleasurable in the present.

A mind stretched: The psychology of repeat consumption

“…For example, participants in one experiment (Morewedge et al., 2010, Study 1) failed to anticipate the full extent of their reactions and sensations involved in the moment of crunching on salty potato chips, which they would come to discover only during the act of consumption; in a “cold” state, chips simply seemed like chips; in a “hot” state, they were revealed to be much more. In another experiment (O'Brien and Roney, 2017, Study 3), participants showed a similar effect when thinking about massage experiences: Participants underestimated the extent to which their attention would be absorbed by a massage while receiving it, neglecting the many salient experiential features involved in such a stimulus that would come to dominate their attention. As another example, Hsee and Zhang (2004) highlighted the case of comparison shopping.…”

Does Active Leisure Improve Worker Well-Being? An Experimental Daily Diary Approach

“…Leisure has already occupied part of our daily lives; however, due to various work and home demands, we tend to overlook the benefits active leisure affords. Additionally, recent experimental findings suggested that people tend to mistake the importance of the order of life domains, which in fact people perceive leisure activities as enjoyable no matter when they engage it (O'Brien & Roney, 2017). The findings from this study primarily focused on the positive side of employee health outcomes; promoting the positive side may be more appealing to people to re-evaluate the importance of leisure and more likely to engage in various activities.…”

Unconventional Consumption Methods and Enjoying Things Consumed: Recapturing the “First-Time” Experience

“…That people can break adaptation simply by changing the method of consumption reveals a potentially effective (yet easy) strategy for better enjoying the things we consume, which can be surprisingly hard: A consistent pattern in national surveys of well-being finds that a majority of working adults reports feeling too busy to find time for fun, and when they do, they struggle to enjoy themselves as much as they want to enjoy themselves (Gallup, 2013; Kahneman, Krueger, Schkade, Schwarz, & Stone, 2004). Likewise, experiments confirm that actively trying to enjoy oneself mostly backfires by adding pressure and setting unattainable expectations (see Ford & Mauss, 2014; O’Brien & Roney, 2017; Schooler, Ariely, & Loewenstein, 2003). Knowing simply to consume something in a (nondisruptive) new way may invite a less dramatic route to enjoyment.…”