The Key Drivers of Experiential Satisfaction in Recreation and Leisure

The attempt here is to model recreation and leisure participant experiential satisfaction in the membership resort or timeshare space  by way of  two sets of influences, one “internal” and the other, “external,” while accounting for the impact of the high-urgency sales process common to the industry. 

Internal influences are part of an “Activity > Experience > Innate Need” dynamic in which the desire to achieve an experience in satisfaction of a psychological need serves to compel recreation and leisure participant decisions and selections. These internal influences may be captured by Likert-type scales measuring both the importance of and satisfaction with a comprehensive set of experiences shown through research to associate with leisure and recreation.  However, although "internals" tell an important part of the story, they do not tell the entire story: external influences also play a significant role in participant satisfaction.

External influences are perceptions of and reactions to the specific participative environment which includes the resort-proper, its aesthetic qualities, entertainment, upkeep of its physical plant, its grounds, infrastructure, and rooms; facility modernity, comfort, and amenities; dining services including quality of food, variety, convenience, cleanliness, the service and wait-staff; maintenance fees and other cost-of-use issues;  and a broader set of externals which includes climate desirability, efficiency of affiliate programs, and in some instances, a negative predisposition characterized as buyer’s remorse brought on by the imposition of “high urgency” marketing and sales methods.

Scrolling toward the bottom of the page, the reader will find the GUI output for a "work-in-progress" structural equation model portraying experiential satisfaction.  The bar beneath the model provides “goodness of fit” measures.  All variable identities have been withheld.