Boredom Alleviation During Unstructured Time: Interviews of Finnish Joutoaika

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School of Business | Master's thesis
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Date

2018

Department

Markkinoinnin laitos

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Mcode

Degree programme

Marketing

Language

en

Pages

48

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Abstract

This thesis studies alleviation of boredom, by studying it in the context of unstructured time, where previous studies have identified consumers to often experience boredom. Growing interest has been diverted towards the phenomena of boredom as a state and antecedents of boredom. However, research about alleviation of boredom is rare. This thesis aims to increase the body of knowledge in this gap. To fit the context of unstructured time to the Finnish people, it was studied in the life-world of joutoaika. Joutoaika, roughly translating to idle time is a type of unstructured time that allows opportunities for meaningful activity, but is also shadowed by the threat of boredom, and guilt for wasting time. Following symbolic interactionism methods, three guided introspection interviews were conducted. Based on the interviews this thesis interprets that activities for alleviation during joutoaika can be divided into two categories of diversions and self-improvement. Diversions were ineffective at alleviation and often followed with negative experiences. Self-improvement allowed a more lasting alleviation and lead to other positive experiences. This thesis presents two transtheoretical strategies for engaging more with effective self-improvements: foregrounding meaningful activities, such as self-improvement, by increasing perceived resources for them, and backgrounding less meaningful activies, such as diversions, by decreasing perceived resources available for them.

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Thesis advisor

Toyoki, Sammy

Keywords

boredom, unstructured time, diversion, self-improvement, transtheoretical strategy

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https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:aalto-201811235830

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