UNIT 7

RECREATION AND LEISURE

Learning Outcomes
At the end of this chapter, you should be able to:
1. define recreation leisure;
2. describe the motivations for recreational participation;
3. discuss tourism and categories
4. explain the role of sports and tourism as major recreation service components;
5. differentiate theme parks, water parks, fun centers, and Sports tourism;

Meaning of Recreational and Leisure

• The dictionary defines recreation as the process of giving new life to something, of restoring something.
• Leisure is defined as the productive, creative, or contemplative use of free time.

Recreational Activities
 Recreational activities include all kinds of sports, both team and individual such as baseball, softball,
football, basketball, tennis, badminton, swimming, and skiing.
 Hiking, jogging, aerobics, and rock climbing are active forms of recreation.
 Passive recreational activities include reading, playing, fishing, and listening to music, gardening,
playing computer games, and watching television or movies.

Recreational Participation
• The most common notion of recreation is that it is primarily a participation in sports and games.
• Recreation actually includes an extremely broad range of leisure activities. (travel and tourism, cultural
entertainment, participation in the arts, hobbies, membership in social clubs, or interests groups, nature
related activities such as hunting and fishing, and attendance at parties, special events, and fitness
activities.)
• Recreation may be enjoyed with thousands of participants or spectators or may be a solitary experience.
It may be very strenuous or may be primarily a mental activity. It may act as a lifetime of interest and
involvement or may consists of a single, isolated experience.

Motivation for Recreational Participation

• Many participants take part in recreation as a form of relaxation and release from the pressures of work
and other tensions.
• Another recreational motivation is the need to express creativity, expose hidden talents, or pursue
excellent in various forms of personal expression.
• For some participants, active recreation offers a channel for releasing hostility and aggression.
• Many individuals take part in recreational activities which involve community service, provide leaders in
fraternal or religious organizations and promote health and physical fitness.
• Deeply involve in various forms of elite culture such as music, drama, dance, literature, and the fine arts.

Types of Organized Recreation

1. Government recreation agencies  these are the federal, state, provincial agencies, and local
departments that provide recreation and leisure as services as a primary function.  Also include are
other agencies that offer recreation programs as a secondary responsibility such as those concerned
with social service, education, special populations and the armed forces.
2. Voluntary non-profit organization  these are the governmental, non-profit agencies, both sectarian
and non-sectarian which serve the public at large with multiservice programs that often include a
substantial element of recreational opportunity.  The most popular voluntary organizations include
the Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, YMCA, YWCA, and YM-YWHA.
 3. Private membership organizations  they provide recreational and social activities for their own
members and in some cases assist community recreation needs. (Golf, tennis, yacht, athletic, and
country clubs.)  Also included under this category are the recreation sponsors connected to
residence such as swimming pools, sports or fitness complexes or clubs attached to leisure villages,
and apartments or condominium retirements or retirement communities.
4. Commercial recreation enterprises  these are privately owned businesses which operate to make a
profit such as ski centers, bowling alleys, night clubs, movie houses, theaters, health spas or fitness
centers, dancing schools and theme parks.
5. Employee recreation programs  They serve those who work for companies or employees by providing
recreation as a part of a total personnel benefits package linked to other services concerned with
employee health and fitness.
6. Armed forces recreation  although it is obviously a form of government- sponsored activity, it is
unique in its setting and purpose. Each of the major branches of the armed forces operates an
extensive network of recreation facilities and programs.
7. Campus recreation  It includes intramural athletics or sports clubs, social activities, travel programs,
performing arts groups, entertainment, lounges, film series and other forms of recreation on college,
and university campuses.
8. Therapeutic recreation services  Theses include any other program designed to meet the needs of
persons with physical or mental disabilities, individuals with poor health, dependent aging persons,
social deviant persons in correctional facilities, and similar special groups.

Two Major Recreation Service Components

• In addition to the eight types of organized recreation, sports, and tourism represent major areas of
recreational programming and constitute powerful economic forces through their attraction for people
every age and background.
• Uniquely, they have strong links to each to the growing field of sports tourism and also overlap heavily
with outdoor recreation attractions.

Sports as Popular Recreation

• Sports are major areas of recreational involvement. Of all the types of recreational involvement, sports
command the highest degree of personal interest and emotional involvement.
• Sports are generally defined as physical activities demanding exertion and skill, involving competition,
carried on with both formal rules and general standards of etiquette and fair play.

Categorizing Destinations
a. The centered destination is the commonest- a traditional form of holiday arrangement in which the
tourist travels to the destination, where they expect to spend the majority of their time, with perhaps
occasional excursions to visit nearby attractions. The classic seaside holiday, winter sports resort or
short city break represent the most common types in this grouping.
b. Destinations that form a base from where the surrounding region can be explored. Some hotels in
Baguio City for example have successfully reformulated their marketing strategy to sell themselves as
bases for exploring the nearby places such as La Trinidad, Tublay, Itogon, or Atok, Benguet.
c. Multicenter holidays, where two or more destinations are equal importance in the itinerary.
d. Touring destinations, which will be part of a linear itinerary, including stops at a number of points.
e. Transit destinations which merely provide an overnight stop en route to the final destination.
TOURISM – A Major Recreation Service Component
Tourism is a second major area of diversified recreational involvement. Several major elements in the
tourism enterprise which are closely linked to the growth of tourism as a form of recreation are the theme
parks, water parks, fun centers, and sports tourism.

A. COASTAL TOURISM- is a process involving tourists and the people and places they visit. It is more
specifically defined as tourism brought to bear on the coastal environment and its natural and cultural
resources. Most coastal zone tourism takes place along the shore and in the water immediately adjacent
to the shoreline. Coastal tourism activities occur outdoors and indoors as recreation, sport and play,
and as leisure and business.
B. URBAN TOURISM- also called City tourism is a form of tourism that takes place in the large human
agglomerations, usually in the main cities or urban areas of each country. Examples, theaters, museum,
art galleries, as well as in historical-and modern-architectural and the appeal of shopping as a leisure
activity.
C. MEDICAL TOURISM- used to refer to tourists who travel to another country specifically to consult
specialist or undergo medical treatment.
D. RURAL TOURISM- the countryside offers a very different holiday experience from seaside and urban
tourism and because of this the widespread appeal of the countryside is of relatively low in the 21 st
century and less people in the urban areas appreciate nature, peaceful environment, less gadget world
and a more conducive place treatment in their own country.
 Lakes and mountains- one of the principal draws of rural tourism is lakes and mountains-
preferably a combination of the two.
 Trail tourism- hiking or rambling had become a popular past time.
 Waterscapes- demand for leisure and recreation using boats has always been popular among
the tourists and many great places provide ideal opportunities for water based tourist activities.
 Woodland and forest- areas of woodlands and dense foliage provide yet another appeal for
tourism.
 Agrotourism- is a model development of mountainous and remote areas of the country.
 Wilderness areas- as open countryside becomes rarer in the development countries, measures
are introduce to protect what remains, especially where this has been largely untouched until
recent years.
E. ISLAND TOURISM- is one form of destination that lies somewhere between the rural and coastal
tourism in terms of its attractiveness especially because of its isolation from other land forms.
F. SPA TOURISM- the term “spa” is said to have originated from the town of that name Belguim, although
some chain that “Sanitas Per Aqua”- health through water-is the true derivation of the term, which had
been applied equally to resorts that provide healthy air (often mountain or seaside resorts) and others
offering so called “healing” waters.
G. CULTURAL TOURISM- one of the fastest growing areas of tourism. In its widest definition it
encompasses both ‘high’ and ‘low’ culture.
H. RELIGIOUS TOURISM- travel for religious purposes tends to be group among the ‘miscellaneous’ forms
of tourism, falling outside the central purposes of leisure or business.
I. SHOPPING- plays an important role in tourism. While retailing is not normally considered a sector of
the industry, tourist purchases make up a considerable part of the revenue of many shops and in
resorts shops may be entirely or largely dependent on the tourist trade.
J. SOUVENIRS- essential items for most visitors.
K. SPORTS TOURISM-
THEME PARKS
Theme parks usually concentrate on one dominant theme which may be historical, cultural or geographical.
Like: Marine Zoological Park Disneyland

1. Water Parks
• A specialized type of theme park are the water parks, they feature wave pools, slides, chutes, shows
and other forms of water based play and entertainment. Universal’s Islands Jurassic Park River of
Adventure Bilge Rat Barges Poseidon’s Fury

2. Sports Tourism
• The purpose of sports tourism is to participate directly in a form of sport or attend sports events as a
spectator. In the past, only the team traveled the spectators remained behind to read about their
favorite game or to experience the game through radio and television.
• The World Olympics is the biggest sports event. It attracts millions of spectators and generate
millions of dollars in revenue.

Attractions
 Are the most important component in the tourism system.
 The motivators why people travel

Four categories of attractions

 Features within the natural environment
 Purpose built structures and sites designed for purpose other than attracting visitors
 Purpose-built structures and sites designed to attract visitors
 Special events

*end of module 7*
 WORKSHEET
NAME: SUBJECT:
COURSE: DATE:

MODULE 7 ACTIVITY
1. Conduct a study on how more frequent but shorter vacations affect recreation and leisure.
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2. Research on how growth of government security programs and employment benefits affect recreation and
leisure.
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