Pastimes (hobbies) and Mental Wellbeing

Summary

Pastimes are also called hobbies or leisure activities. Hobbies are activities which people have outside of their job, their family, and the obligations to society. Hobbies can benefit mental health and contribute to mental wellbeing. Research studies have demonstrated the benefits of having a hobby. Engaging in a hobby can help a person experience mental wellbeing in many ways. Take time to remember what hobbies you used to have and have stopped practicing. Engage in your hobby now to help yourself have improved mental health.

Leisure activities or pastimes or hobbies are activities outside of our obligations to family and friends, outside of our job, and outside of our requirements as members of society. Pastimes can benefit our mental health. Pastimes (hobbies) contribute to our mental wellbeing.

Let’s explore further.

Evidence for Pastimes (hobbies) and Mental Wellbeing

I will review two recent research articles exploring the benefits of pastimes on mental health. This post does not provide an exhaustive review of the literature, just of two articles that caught my interest. Please find links to the research articles in the section “Additional Resources”.

Study in Nature Medicine

In a 2023 article published in Nature Medicine, Mak et al revealed the outcome of following over 93 000 people in 16 countries for 4 to 8 years, with average age of participants being between 71.7 and 75.9 years of age. Over 70% of participants were retired with the exception of three countries, China, Spain, and Japan. There were significant variations in the percentage of participants engaged in a hobby. Over 60% of participants had long term mental health or medical conditions.

Engaging in hobbies was positively associated with fewer depressive symptoms, better self-reported health, higher life satisfaction and more happiness. Life satisfaction may be related to the particular country’s happiness index and the life expectancy of residents of that country. Even in countries with lower hobby engagement or lower happiness index, the association between hobbies and the outcomes (life satisfaction, happiness, self-reported health status, and depressive symptoms) persisted.

The authors posit that engagement in hobbies may contribute to older adults feeling in control of their minds and bodies; older adults having a sense of competency; and older adults having a purpose in life. Recall my post on mental wellbeing and motivation and the reference to self-determination theory (autonomy, competency, and social connectedness) predicting satisfaction in an activity and in life.

Article in Applied Psychology: Health and Wellbeing

Takiguchi et al conducted two surveys, one prior to the COVID 19 pandemic and one during the pandemic. The participants lived in Japan.

The authors discuss the correlation between resilience and engagement in leisure activities. They based their study approach on the broaden-and-build theory which posits that positive emotions, in this case derived from leisure, expand mental resources for coping.

The broaden-and-build theory proposed by Elizabeth Fredrickson in 1998 is backed by research. Resilience is one of the outcomes as a result of positive emotions, as proposed by the theory. In contrast to negative emotions which are generally linked to specific actions, positive emotions tend to elicit less specific actions, such as creativity and experimentation, which can apply in various contexts. Check out the article in Psychology Today for a review of the theory:

Broaden-and-Build Theory of Positive Emotions https://positivepsychology.com/broaden-build-theory

Back to the research by Takiguchi et al.

I appreciate the elegance of the study in terms of the survey questions. Participants selected hobbies from a list of 100 leisure activities. Participants rated their level of resilience and their depressive symptoms. Their results confirmed their hypothesis about leisure activity engagement decreasing current and future depressive symptoms and increasing resilience.

Take a look at the limitations of the study noted by the authors. One limitation which struck me was the lack of differentiation between physical and non-physical activities in the list of 100 activities. The second limitation to capture my attention was the potential deficit of the screening tool for depression in accurately measuring depressive symptoms. The study may not be generalizable but its results offer opportunities for future research.

Takeaways: Pastimes (hobbies) and Mental Wellbeing

Research tells us that engaging in hobbies benefits our mental health. Pastimes (hobbies) and mental wellbeing are natural companions. By engaging in hobbies, we may experience fewer depressive symptoms; an increase in happiness; an increase in resilience; improved life satisfaction; a more positive perception of our health status; and a sense of self-determination.

Additional benefits may include the following:

Leisure activities may introduce us to opportunities to flex our brains, as we learn physical techniques or mental skills.
Pastimes can connect us with people, providing socialization and the benefits of social connectedness.
Hobbies may include physical activity, conditioning our muscles and generating the endorphins, enkephalins, and endocannabinoids for us to experience happiness.
Leisure activities may expose us to nature and the beauty of Mother Earth.
Hobbies can generate gratitude, for our abilities, for the people sharing the hobby with us, and for the resources at our disposal.
Musical pastimes have the possibility of lifting our spirits and affecting our nervous systems in all the ways I mentioned in my post on music and mental health.

Call to Action

Take a break from work and chores.

Find a moment to consider what activity gives you joy and which you may have been neglecting. How long has it been since you last engaged in that activity? Days, weeks, months, or years?

Remind yourself how that leisure activity benefitted you, altered your frame of mind, improved your mood, and impacted the lens through which you were conceptualizing difficulties in your life.

What’s stopping you?

The last I checked, we don’t get any younger as the days and years pass. The past is gone, forever.

Carpe diem. Seize the moment. Your mental wellbeing deserves your attention.

Be happy. Be safe. Be well.

Additional Resources

Hobby engagement and mental wellbeing among people 65 years and older in 16 countries. Hei Wan Mak, Teiji Noguchi, Jessica K. Bone, Jacques Wels, Qian Gao, Katsunori Kondo, Tami Saito, Daisy Fancourt. Sept 2023. Nature Medicine. . https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-023-02506-1

The relationship between leisure activities and mental health: The impact of resilience and COVID-19. Yuta Takiguchi, Mie Matsui, Mariko Kikutani, Kota Ebina. Aug 2022. Appl Psychol Well Being. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9538683/