The effects of personality on demand for recreation activities: Some preliminary findings

This paper presents the results of the first stage of a research effort which tries to improve the understanding of travel behavior to recreation activities through the use of personality variables. A battery of personality scales, containing scales from relevant inventories and some new conceptual constructs, were assembled and some preliminary tests for the usefulness of this battery were carried out. It was postulated that personality variables are related to recreation-participation and this postulate was not rejected by the data collected as part of this study. It was also found that participation in different activities is affected by different personality dimensions to different degrees. Therefore, considerable care is needed in selecting the personality scales for use in a given context.