Entry #4 That Which Drives Us

To begin this blog I want you, my audience to think about an activity you have done recently. This can be anything from a sport, workout, social, or house hold activity. Now I want you to think about why you did that activity? What motivated you to participate in the activity? Some might answer because it is fun or relaxing, or it had to be done. This is the constant struggle in daily life. As our day passes how much time do we spend doing things that are "necessary" or for ourselves? First we must understand how we determine what is the different types of motivation and how do they affect our daily lives and the activities we are involved in. Specifically we will look at Intrinsic, Extrinsic, and Amotivation types of motivation.

Intrinsic motivation is when a person does an activity for the sake of the activity and the satisfaction of the activity. The activity itself generally arrives spontaneously when the activity is of value to. 

Extrinsic motivation is when there is an outside push to participate in the activity such as a reward or punishment, shame or guilt. 

Amotivtaiton is when the person has no interest in the activity at all. Their engagement is without energy, intent, and they lack the willingness to take action. 

In the field of recreation, motivation is essential to the participation level of the public related to the product or activity you are introducing/maintaining. If you do not know who your audience is and why they are coming to the activity then you do not know how to structure and intrigue the consumer base. For instance, parks and recreation in cities usually have a little league or beginning level sport program. There are two factors that need to be considered with motivation parents and youth. The motivation for participation can differ between the youth and parent. The parents motivation can lean towards extrinsic if they want their child to join a sport to keep active and fit. This can be derived from the wanting to fulfill a societies standard on how healthy youth should be. Or it can more intrinsic because the parents value personally the sports for the holistic features it has. Examples my child is having fun, keeping an active life style to better health in future, my child is learning social skills, and I get to be involved with a sport I (as the parent) enjoyed as a youth or love to watch. 

In the child's scenario an extrinsic motivation is I play because I know my parent(s) really like this sport and if I participate in this sport I will get to spend time with them. Amotivation would be represented when the child only participates because the parents tell them they have to go. They would be the participant that would rather be looking at the flowers or bugs then watching/actively involved with the game. Intrinsic motivation can be found when the child tells the parent they want to play the a certain sport and will on their volition grab equipment to play/practice the sport. This is the youth that experience the first steps of flow. 

These are the features that recreation specialist need to consider when they create/modify a program. We have to consider what is it that people are looking to gain from the event? Is it knowledge, skills, personal satisfaction, or living up to a standard? When this is determined the next step is to create a program for the motivation of the population attending or wish to gain. For example why would a person choose one cooking class over the another? One class offered is basic skills class, how to hold and use a knife safely, temperatures meats need to be at, and so forth. Verses classes that teach participants how to use wine, herbs, and break down a whole animal, farm to table cooking. The motivation would be different for each. In the first example the participant possibly needs taught basics of cooking for self or others to eat meals at home, seen more as a necessity. Where as the how to incorporate herbs and wines would be for someone who has the basic skills and loves to cook and try new recipes. The audiences tone for each class will be different. 

Recreation exist because of motivation to do things other then provided for our basic needs. Whether you participate in recreation because you have to live up to standard inducted by society, out of personal satisfaction/fulfillment, or other aspects it is a component of human life. As recreation facilitators we have to understand the motivation and the needs for each motivation to reach the participants. 

Entry # 3: Serious or Specialization?

Recreation Specialization or Serious leisure, which is the future of Recreation? 

To grasp a basis of these two concepts we must define each one. Recreation specialization is when an individual is active in only one activity or sport. There knowledge and participation usually begin at a young age, some as early as five or six. Reinforcement is gained through peers during the course of the specialization during the activity and outside it. For example in sports you can see teammates reinforcing a behavior of free through during the game and others after by trophy's and stats for individuals success. An example of specialization would be an athlete that been playing a sport at an young age who continued to play only that sport as they went through schooling. 

Serious Leisure is the pursuit of an amateur, an individual that lacks certain skills or abilities to be considered a professional, hobbyist, or volunteer who launches themselves into a particular activity. Usually people who participate in serious leisure have a knowledge basis of the activity that is great but might have found the passion later in life and could not build the skills to take on the career as a profession. An example of serious leisure is an endeavors is an individual that likes basketball but views themselves as not having the skills to play professionally but instead will instead learn all players in basketball in NBA and college stats and life history, a Wikipedia person on the sport. 

Now many of you might be wondering what does these to classification have to do with recreation and its future. There has always been sports and its fans that support the players and know information about them. How does one change the concept of recreation or recreation majors? 

The answer is that recreation itself might not change but the people who teach it or organize the events will. When I think about who I was couched by when I played a sport I know that my couch played that sport prior to instructing others about it. But a recent trend is when individuals find an activity later in life, research it in depth, and use that passion to make a career of it. This relates to recreation and its future by who will be the ones directing the events. Is it going to the person who specialized in the activity at a young age who might not have the extensive knowledge of the history or science of how to achieve optimal results but has the skill set to teach and relate to the audience? That question is still unknown because some can argue there has always been couches that never played who developed the skills to teach later in life. Yes, I would agree with this but to take it a step further and ask is it better to hire a person with a degree or someone who presents the knowledge and passion for a position?

These are things that we must consider when hiring staff. There will always be those who will know more about an activity because they have a passion for it but does that qualify them to direct an activity? This is difficult to answer because a common feature of recreation majors is that they interested the field because they liked a certain activity and want to make that their career. Do you want some who has experienced the activity to teach it for relatedness or do you want someone who has built their knowledge over time who can also produce the desired results? As an employer you must take into consideration of who your clients will be. Are they going to come to you for results or the experience? If it is results then a person with in depth knowledge would be a better candidate. Vice versa is if you want to provided an experience first and results later then a person who the skills, relatedness, and specialization in the activity would be the better choice. 

As many of you are reading this you might be saying to yourself that a person who specializes in the activity also as a serious leisure for it as well. This is a valid argument but in my opinion the difference between the two the the amount of time given to the activity. Those who specialize might not wake up thinking about that activity, start doing it right away, and until they end their day. The example that comes to my mind is animals lovers specifically dog show owners. A judge of the event might know all the qualifications for a pristine show dog but they themselves might not know what goes into getting an animal ready, or exactly how long it takes for certain dogs to make strides across the floor without wasting a step. The judge might know the rules for judging the animals but they do not have the passion for the history of the competition. 

I do not have the answers as to the future of qualifications for who is more qualified to lead recreation activities but I do there will be and already is an impact of those who par tact in serious leisure believing that individuals are qualified to teach, judge, and manage an event they have a strong knowledge in. 

Entry #2 It's all about the experience!

I want you to think about what is some highlights of your leisure activities you have been involved in? Was that memory of your experience something you did for the first time or after your gain skill? Was their challenge or risk involved? Who was there? What was it that stuck out in your mind to you?

My next topic of discussion is about what makes leisure activities worth participating in and how experience economy influences choices. Is the experience based solely on the money we spend or the experience we wish to gain? Research has shown that once to sale a product we must now sale the experience gained. If a company cannot sale the products uses and help the audience imagine the experience of the product then success of the product lowers. Today we will discuss what attracts the audience to that activity and how do you maintain that perceived experience once they are participating. To describe how this topic works I will be using the restaurant Dick's Last Resort in Las Vegas Nevada.

                                                                    

In the case of Dick's restaurant the theme of the experience they are selling to the customer is opposite of most restaurants out there. They want to talk back to, be sassy, yell, and name call the customer when providing service. The experience economy they are selling is you are here to be treated like you are bothering me and are not worth time. Many of you might be thinking what is the difference between Dick's and other restaurants that you have seen out there that provided a similar experience of high ting the negative cues? The difference with Dick's and other restaurants is that Dick's could be considered a non-family friendly environment. Some of the words used would make even a sailor would blush. The experience economy they are selling is unique by their use of adult content and border line excessively demeaning comments towards customers.

The question then becomes how did they sale the experience to the audience to make them remember and agree with the restaurants name "Dick's last resort"? Firstly, they greeted guest at the reservation station with a quick question and comment of "Have your ever been here before?" and "Here we server with attitude. Just the (number of people) of you huh" . After seating guest and dropping down menus the wait staff walks towards the table and proceeds to use general names later the name calling becomes specific to the guest. For example they might make a comment about they type of clothing, hair style, or facial expression you display and base a new "name" for the guest. During the course of the meal the wait staff will make an individualized hat out of paper, resembling the white top hats a teacher would place on disruptive student in the corner, and write moderately vulgar things on the hat for the customer to wear and keep as part of the memorabilia. When the wait staff makes eye contact with customers they give a sigh of annoyance and walk towards the table to check on the guest.

How does Dick's stimulate the senses to heighten the experience? Appearance, the restaurant decor resembles an run down shack. The tables are en-elongated wood picnic tables and the restaurant is decorated in money that wait staff has received over the years with comments, number, names, an such written on it. While the restaurant itself is clean the dark finishes make the restaurant look menacing. Classic rock music and 50's 60's songs and pictures transport guest to a different time or place then present day or even Vegas bling and lights. The female wait staff has their hair and make-up similar to pin-up models in classic movies.

As the experience comes to an end guest are directed towards the memorabilia station with shirts, cups, hats, pictures, and other assorted items to re-assert the experience in the future. They also have comment cards available for concerns next to a sign stating what the service should and should not be like. Overall the experience Dick's Last Resort restaurant presents is if you are in the mood to take verbal smacking and can laugh about how you never before paid to be treated like an annoyance, Dick's is the place for you.

Entry #1 That optimal point

In my previous post I discussed what is leisure, play, and recreation. To further that conversation I will discuss a particular theory to can connect play and experience in relation to the topic. 

Recently when discussing with colleagues and classmates about leisure studies the topic of Flow or "the zone" was brought up. Flow is that moment in time when the ability/skill of a person is equally balanced with challenge of an activity.  When I played competitive softball there were moments when I intrinsically moved to a play and made plays on instinct without a single thought. The concept of flow has been thoroughly researched by Dr. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. Dr. Csikszentmihalyi describes flow as the point when the participant is at an optimal psychological state, a state of consciousness, immersion in the activity, concentrated focus, and a perceived optimal experience. In essence flow is experienced when a person maintains a loss of concentration of  outside distracts and concentrates purely on the activity in which they are in engaged in at that moment. If you have ever caught yourself say "I lost track of time" or "Time got away from me", more then likely you have experienced flow while actively participating in that given activity. 

With the explanation and examples presented one might wonder how do we determine when someone has reach that optimal point of skill and challenge creating "flow"? Firstly, taking from the conceptual definition of how flow can be experienced. I can narrow specific domains in which I can begin to create operational definitions that list variables to determine if someone has experienced flow. Possible variables included but are not limited to: awareness of sounds and movements not in the area of play, the amount of time required to preform an action, the amount of eye contact and or body language with other members involved, and overall satisfaction expressed by the participant(s). 

When determining a persons awareness of the surroundings not in the area of play we first must determine what is the area of play. For the purpose of this example the area of play is the marked or known area in which a person will be activity using for the given activity. For example the lines drawn a basketball gym floor is the area of play and the bleachers and benches for coaches and extra players is the outside information processed preventing flow. For our purpose a low level of interaction and reaction to the out of play area is one determining variable of being a state of flow. 

To determine the amount of to perform an action we can consider the pace and quick reactions of the participant(s). It takes about one to two more seconds to perform an action if thought is required instead of instinctively using automaticity to complete a task. When measuring this amount of time we can also look at the amount of eye contact or body language expressed between participants before and after an action is performed. Was there communication prior or was it spontaneous based on prior knowledge of patterns of the participant(s)? The lower amount of time to perform an action is a positive variable towards flow occurring. 

Lastly, a variable that will vary from participant but is still a factor to determine flow is the satisfaction of the participant. Satisfaction for this purpose is determined by the overall feeling of enjoyment and loss of time the participant experienced during the activity. A high rating of satisfaction and/or loss of time from the participant is a positive variable that flow had occurred. 

If all of the variables are met then based on my construct flow has been met for the given activity participant(s) engaged in. 

Overall flow is that perfect combination when skill level of the individual is proportionate to the challenge being presented. Flow is the occurrence of instinct presenting itself when trying to reach the goal presented by the challenge.  

Fun clip about the "the zone" flow

https://youtu.be/0vEIDij8Q9k

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

http://www.ted.com/talks/mihaly_csikszentmihalyi_on_flow?language=en

Entry #practice

My name is Ms. Jackson and I have worked in the field of youth recreation for six years as a program implementer and creator. My responsibility were to create programs that not only had the youth activity involved but also provided a holistic perspective on life skills and decisions.

Leisure, Play? How can someone begin to separate these three things into different categories? Some would say that one or more interact with each other in every event we do in personal time. In the course of this reading we will narrow our understanding of each term definition before we address how an event can have multiple of these terms comprised together working in harmony forming leisure, recreation, or play.

When considering play, what might come to mind is children playing at a park or in the yard, laughing, cheering, and gleefully enjoying their time with each others. Consider play as being instinctual, built into our primal conditioning to participate in. Stuart Brown used the example cats when describing how play is essential for a holistic rounded life. "Play allows 'pretend' rehearsal for the challenges and ambiguities of life, a rehearsal in which life and death are not at stake." (Brown, 32) Brown found that play was not for practice in hunting but practice for social skills. The interaction of playful reenactments of situations and learning when conditions change is valuable skill to achieve a balanced life. 

The history of leisure  can be found in individual and group times when people had time to participate in activities that were not necessary to sustain life. They had the freedom to freely participate in organized, planned events outside of time preparing fields, shelter, food to maintain the basic necessities of life. In modern times we would consider this time to be vacations, overseas travel, and extravagant activities. The term conspicuous consumption has been used when describing the purchase of time and activities to represent a status in society.