The impact of pet attachment on life satisfaction: the multi-mediation effects of leisure seriousness and serious leisure rewards

ABSTRACT

Multispecies leisure has recently become an area of attention. Pet-keeping is one of the popular leisure activities today. This study aims to explore the relationship between pet attachment and life satisfaction, with particular focus on the mediating effect of the leisure seriousness and rewards on the relationship mentioned above. A total of 275 responses were collected at a pet exhibition. SEM and SPSS were employed for data analysis. The results revealed that pet attachment is positively related to pet owners’ life satisfaction. The effects of leisure seriousness, personal reward, and social reward were shown to mediate the relationship between pet attachment and life satisfaction. The pet-keeping practices during the COVID-19 pandemic are provided based the serious leisure perspective.

KEYWORDS:

• Multispecies leisure
• pet attachment
• serious leisure
• life satisfaction
• pet-keeping

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/02614367.2022.2115116

Additional information

Funding

The work was supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan [MOST 109-2410-H-130-029-].

Notes on contributors

Jehn-Yih Wong

Jehn-Yih Wong Professor, Department of Business administration, Ming Chuan University, Taiwan. His fields of specialization are Marketing Research, Decision Sciences and Multivariate analysis. His current research interests include Consumer behavior, decision making analysis, Data Mining and Human Resource Management. He has published papers in Annals of Tourism Research, Tourism Management, Service Industries Journal, Journal of Air Transport Management and Transportation Journal.

Ying-Ying Cheng

Ying-Ying Cheng PhD Candidate, Department of Business Administration, Ming Chuan University, Taiwan. Her major is organizational behavior. Her research interest is workplace health and leisure psychology.

Chia-Ying ChouHua

Chia-Ying ChouHua PhD Candidate, Department of Business Administration, Ming Chuan University, Taiwan. Her major is Marketing. Her research interest is leisure psychology and Tourism Management.

Shih-Hao Liu

Shih-Hao Liu Assistant professor, Department of Tourism, Ming Chuan University, Taiwan. His research interests include Leisure Psychology, Organizational Behavior, and Hospitality Human Resource Management. He has published papers in International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management and European Review of Applied Psychology.