Personal emotional journeys associated with adventure activities on packaged mountaineering holidays

1
Personal emotional journeys associated with
adventure activities on packaged mountaineering
holidays

• Gill Pomfret, Senior Lecturer in Tourism
• Meanings, markets and magic 2012 Adventure
  Conference

2
Presentation themes

• Research context questions
• Previous work on emotional journeys of adventure
  participants
• Fieldwork research in Chamonix, French Alps
• Key findings
• perceptions of risk
• contrasting emotions
• other world feelings
• Conclusion

3
Research Context

• Growing interest in experiences of adventure
  tourists
• Growth in packaged adventure holidays adventure
  tourists
• Limited research on experiences of tourists on
  packaged adventure holidays
• Considerable understanding of experiences of
  recreational mountaineers

4
Research Context

• All consuming challenging nature of adventure
• Conflicting emotions within the adventure
  experience
• Emotional journeys during adventure activity
  participation
• Emotional journeys during packaged adventure
  activity participation

5
Research questions

• To investigate the character of the emotional
  journeys of tourists associated with adventure
  activities engaged in as part of their packaged
  mountaineering holidays.
• To evaluate whether the adventure activities
  within these holidays provide experiences that
  tourists consider to be adventurous.

6
Emotional journeys of adventure participants

• Risk taking
• Risk is integral to the adventure experience
  (Ewert, 1985 Martin Priest, 1986 Robinson,
  1992)
• Risk is a non-essential, secondary ingredient of
  adventure (Kane Tucker, 2004 Varley, 2006
  Walle, 1997)
• Differing perceptions of risk held by adventure
  activity participants

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Emotional journeys of adventure participants

• Contrasting emotions
• Waves of terror and elation, joy and despair,
  anxiety and pleasure (Swarbrooke et al, 2003,
  p.14)
• Flow adventure
• A sense of exhilaration, a deep sense of
  enjoyment that is long cherished and that becomes
  a landmark in memory for what life should be
  like (Csikszentmihalyi, 1992, p.3).
• The challenge-skills dimension

8
Emotional journeys of adventure participants

• Other world feelings
• The ordinary world and everyday concerns are
  left behind (Swarbrooke et al, 2003, p.113)
• Adventures core elements flow dimensions
• Influence of the natural environment (Curtin,
  2009 Frederickson Anderson, 1999 Vespestad
  Lindberg, 2011)

9
Fieldwork research

• Qualitative approach
• Data collection in Chamonix region
• tourists on packaged mountaineering holidays
• 38 semi-structured interviews
• carried out during or at end of holiday
• Respondent profile

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Findings - perceptions of risk

• Not feeling at risk
• Lack of risk perceived during mountaineering
  participation
• Guides role in packaged adventure activity
  experiences (Kane Tucker, 2004 Fletcher, 2010)
• The importance of challenge to respondents
  experiences

The course allows for more challenges in a safer
environment because youve always got the guide
there with you. Its a totally different
experience with a guide. On your own, you need
more self-reliance so you have to think for
yourself more.
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Findings - perceptions of risk
I had a big backpack on while walking down these
foot wide paths with a drop off, and I found that
although it wasnt technically challenging,
thats where the adrenalin maybe flowed the most
for me because I got the feeling of if you slip,
youre going to die.

• Feeling at risk
• Did respondents face truly hazardous situations?
• Mountaineering organisations cannot pledge 100
  safety for their clients

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Findings - contrasting emotions

• Intense emotional peaks troughs
• ranged from feelings of abject misery to total
  euphoria
• Experiences of flow or a flow-like state
• perceived positive challenge-skill balance
• the ultimate reward for many respondents

13
Findings - contrasting emotions
There were all these different points when I
thought Im not really convinced Im going to be
able to do this. We got to the top and we
were completely exhausted and we still had 10km
to get back down again. The top was awesome!
It was absolutely exhilarating and wed been
building up to it for two and a half years.
14
Findings - contrasting emotions

• Pushing beyond the comfort zone
• Participants in commodified adventure activities
  play with their fears (Cater, 2006, p.321).
• Felt safe in the presence of the guide

It was a challenge on the ridge climb as there
were often sheer drops on either side and I have
a fear of heights! Part of the challenge was to
see if I could just deal with it. I had to push
myself mentally to do things out of my comfort
zone, but I did it and I felt on a real high
afterwards.
15
Findings - contrasting emotions

• Experiences of flow or flow-like states both
  during after completing mountaineering
  activities

It was just a horrible slog and youre cold and
trying to keep warm, and the way the altitude
affects your brain, you dont seem to think
properly. Once I reached the top, I felt great
but I still had to get down. It was only later
that I felt a deep satisfaction which I find hard
to achieve any other way.
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Findings - other world feelings
in a zone
in a trance

• Presence of flow dimensions
• action-awareness merging
• concentration on the task in hand
• transformation of time
• (Jackson Csikszentmihalyi, 1999)

You are in an altered state anyway because of
the altitude. I had nothing else to worry about.
It was just one activity that was happening at
one point in time. ... Youve got to completely
concentrate on what you are doing, otherwise
things might go wrong.
on a different planet
17
Findings other world feelings
When we were walking through the trees, every so
often wed get a great view and I just kept
thinking oh, its brilliant to be here. When
I watched the sun go down it made me feel like I
was on top of the world.

• Influence of the natural mountain environment
• euphoric feelings
• less demanding activities
• Natural environment induces emotionally charged
  highs (Curtin, 2009 Frederickson Anderson,
  1999 Vespestad Lindberg, 2011)

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Conclusion

• Character of the emotional journeys of tourists
  on packaged mountaineering holidays
• Perceived risk not integral to emotional journeys
• Intense emotional peaks and troughs
• Other world feelings
• Do the adventure activities within these holidays
  provide experiences that tourists consider to be
  adventurous?
• Genuine adventures experienced yet tourists were
  not exposed to completely unadulterated adventure

19
References

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