ABSTRACT
Leisure can be approached as immediate experience. Certain elements are abstracted from such experience to identify the qualities that make it leisure. Experience is going through an episode or event as well as processing the perceptions of that time period. Most investigation of leisure up to the 1980s has given primary attention to form. Leisure activities were found to be meaning-laden in the sense of being chosen because certain outcomes were anticipated. These outcomes or satisfactions varied with the social position of the individual, especially with changing work and family roles through the life course. The basis of most study of meanings of leisure has been that the individual accumulates a kind of reservoir of experiences that are remembered and interpreted. The early work of John Neulinger presented a model of leisure that consists of three attitudinal dimensions. The primary dimension is “perceived freedom.” The others are attitudinal: intrinsic motivation and final rather than instrumental goals.
