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Abstract
This study was designed to investigate the impact of actual experience on experience preference. Experience preference measurements were taken before and after a hiking experience. A shift between pre-activity and post-activity experience preference judgments was hypothesized due to the effect of psychological adjustment to reduce dissonance between pre-activity experience preference and the actual experience. Subjects were divided into two groups based upon whether or not they achieved a given experience during their onsite activity. The application of dissonance theory suggested that “achievers” would increase their reported preference for a given experience between the pre-and post-assessments, while “non-achievers” would decrease their reported preferences. Consistent with the application of dissonance theory, repeated-measures ANOVAs indicated the presence of an interaction effect between experience achievement and time (pre/post-activity) for the experience preference domains of “physical exercise” and “escaping civilization”.
