UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — As a Penn State undergraduate student in the 1970s, John Dattilo said he felt pulled in two directions. He wanted to pursue a major in special education to help people with disabilities, yet he believed that leisure was a key component to health and happiness in life. So, when Dattilo saw that many people were often excluded from leisure, he decided to merge his passions and pursue a major in therapeutic recreation as well.
Dattilo then launched his career by working as a special education teacher in a residential setting where he also worked to facilitate leisure for residents with multiple severe disabilities. His career eventually led him back to Penn State, where he became professor of recreation, park, and tourism management.
Throughout his career of more than 40 years, Dattilo has worked to encourage and facilitate leisure opportunities and their accessibility for all people.
With Memorial Day kicking off the unofficial start of summer — bringing warmer weather and increased opportunities for outdoor recreation — in just a few weeks, Dattilo discussed his recent research and what his career has revealed about why leisure matters.
Q: What is leisure?
Dattilo: When people hear the word leisure, they sometimes think of activities like sitting on a couch all weekend, binging TV shows. That might be a good example of the use of “free time,” but it is not necessarily leisure.
Free time is neither good nor bad, but it can involve boredom, substance use, loneliness and other negative attributes.
Leisure, however, is about engaging in recreational activities during free time that bring us positive experiences, meaning and identity. It allows us to be authentic and present in the moment.
Leisure reduces loneliness and boredom, whether we are participating in leisure alone — like a bird watcher who wanders a local park after work — or with others — like playing music and sharing conversation with a group of friends. Neither of these activities are automatically leisure; we experience leisure when we immerse ourselves in a way that engages us wholly.
Q: Why does leisure matter in our lives?
Dattilo: Reducing loneliness and increasing people’s sense of meaning in life are important. Leisure can also help us build a sense of community and connection to others. I believe finding ways to experience leisure is one of the keys to living a satisfying life and maintaining meaningful relationships.
Everyone encounters different challenges and barriers to leisure in their life — circumstances like time, money, physical or mental skills — so, I have consistently worked together with people to overcome those barriers. In recent years, we have identified connections between leisure and healthy aging working with colleagues in the Penn State Center for Healthy Aging on how to promote leisure among older adults.
Leisure may seem like a luxury, but once people’s basic needs are met, leisure is central to quality of life. I think most people appreciate the joy associated with leisure, but I also think that many people do not know how powerful a force leisure can be in their lives. Leisure brings so much good to the world.
Q: How is leisure connected to health?
Dattilo: Our recent research indicates that regular leisure engagement and associated support predicts positive physical and mental health outcomes, including happiness and finding meaning and purpose in life. When leisure facilitates psychological flow — a state where people become focused while engaged in an enjoyable activity that requires both concentration and skill — people experience less loneliness and more social inclusion.
Research has demonstrated connections between happiness and perceiving that you are in good health, and psychological well-being is associated with better cardiovascular health and lower risk of death. So, through leisure’s association with happiness, well-being and a sense of purpose, it can influence our physical health.
A sense of purpose also relates to lower rates of depression, so leisure positively influences our mental health as well.
Q: How does society benefit when people engage in leisure?
Dattilo: As we experience leisure with other people, we create connections. Through those connections, we create a better society. That’s the idea of a society — forging connections so that everyone’s lives are enriched.
There are so many experiences that result in us competing with others over limited resources. If two of us are hunting for the same animal or seeking the same promotion, only one of us can win. When we engage in leisure together, we both win.
In leisure, we can engage openly with other people, so it is a conducive context for inclusion and learning. There are also connections between leisure and gratitude for people of all ages, including university students and our elders.
Q: What does society as a whole need to learn about leisure?
Dattilo: As a society in the United States, we focus strongly on job skills. Those skills are important, but there is more to life than work. The basis of our country — as stated in the Declaration of Independence — is the pursuit of happiness.
There is value in helping people increase their quality of life as well as their job skills. We often equate wealth with happiness, but wealth can negatively influence our ability to savor positive experiences. One of the best ways to pursue happiness is through leisure.
There is a need for people in professions that help other people — teachers, social workers, medical professionals and others — to support leisure among the people they serve. There are so many people throughout the world who need support so that they can experience leisure and who can benefit from leisure education.
Q: Why should people care about leisure for all people?
Dattilo: Everyone has challenges of some kind. Some needs are just easier to accommodate than others. Many people experience leisure by recreating in parks or in another natural setting. But many other people experience barriers to spending time in natural environments because they lack the income, they have health challenges, or they live in a densely populated urban area without access to nature.
For most of us, having free time facilitates leisure, but for others, that is not the case. So, we want to work as a society to provide individuals with opportunities for leisure.
Currently, that may sound political, but, fundamentally, it is not. I have taught this my entire career, and it was never seen as a political topic until recently. Society has become more polarized, but if people look at their values, most of us agree that everyone deserves the opportunity to live a meaningful life. There is a fairly straight line connecting leisure and a better life for anyone whose basic needs are met.
Q: How can an individual experience more leisure?
Dattilo: Achieving leisure often starts with focusing on the present and being mindful. We try not to let the past or future dominate our thoughts. Yes, we must learn from the past and plan for the future, but when we become absorbed in either the past or future, we might miss the joys associated with the present. Consequently, we risk not being present with our family members or friends and may not notice opportunities for leisure.
By attending to our present conditions and focusing on the positives, we put more into life and get more out of life. We reach past amusement and achieve amazement. Also, we appreciate what we have, which leads to gratitude. A life of gratitude is conducive to leisure and happiness and allows us to flourish.