Outdoor expedition adventures facilitate many psychological benefits which make the risks, uncertainties, and pain worth experiencingThis UK-based study examined the lived experiences of extended-period expeditionary adventurers to understand why they adventured and what perceived benefits they gained from them. The researchers defined extended-period expeditionary adventures as enduring expeditions, travels, and experiences that are unusual or daring, last longer than a week, and involve risk, commitment, and responsibility. In doing so, the study focused on the more extreme end of the outdoor adventure continuum.
This was a qualitative study which interviewed seven British extended-period expeditionary adventurers to understand their personal lived experiences. The four female and three male participants were all white, ranged in age from 23-55, and identified as either part-time or full-time adventurers who had completed several multi-week or multi-month expeditions. For example, participants had completed North and South Pole expeditions, 5,000 and 6,000-mile runs, bike tours and rowing trips spanning entire countries and continents, sailing trips around the world, and mountaineering expeditions to summit the highest peaks on all seven continents. The researchers transcribed all interviews and interpreted them through a recursive, thematic analysis which attempted to capture the phenomena of extended expeditionary adventures and the psychology of those who attempt them.
This qualitative data analysis yielded three master themes, which were prevalent across all interviews: (1) to go knowingly into the unknown; (2) autonomy, the real outdoors, and liberation; and (3) resilience and growth. At the pre-adventure stage, participants emphasized going knowingly into the unknown—intense planning and risk management coupled with the uncertainty of choosing to enter geographically, physically, and psychologically challenging environments where risks, uncertainty, loneliness, and possible death were realities. When commencing adventures, participants described ecstatic feelings followed by a focus on liberation, the lure of self-reliance, and the unpredictability of the outdoor world. According to interviews, real nature played a vital role in developing participants’ physical and psychological fitness through real dangers, dynamic challenges, and unpredictable environments. In expeditionary adventures, the real outdoors developed personal autonomy and resilience, awe and wonder at nature, the self-efficacy to cope and act in challenging circumstances, and openness to learning and growth that participants did not experience in human-organized environments. The three female participants, in particular, described themselves as being more capable and resilient in outdoor adventures than at home or at work. Finally, participants described a love-hate relationship with challenging aspects of expeditionary adventures—physical and psychological challenges that felt painful in the moment were later experienced as perverse and masochistic pleasures, sources of confidence and pride, post-challenge highs, and markers of psychological resilience, growth, wisdom, self-development, self-actualization, self-transcendence, and expanded geographical, physical, and psychological boundaries. Overall, the theme of resilience and growth explained why most participants choose to engage in extended expedition adventures—their ability to survive, if not thrive, in challenging outdoor expeditions developed their capacity for resilience, growth, and empowerment.
Overall, expedition adventurers choose challenging nature experiences because of their psychological benefits and capacities to expand their geographical, physical, and psychological boundaries. Synthesizing findings across themes, this qualitative research suggests that the combination of physical activity with an optimal mix of challenge, skill, advanced planning, and uncertainty led to psychological well-being for these exemplary participants in extended period expeditionary adventures. Extended experiences in the wild provided the challenges, peak experiences, and authentic problems which intensify and accelerate learning and growth. For these participants, the feelings of freedom, autonomy, resilience, post-adventure growth, unity with nature, self-actualization, and transcendence made the risks, uncertainties, pain, and potentially fatal experiences worth choosing. This study was limited by its purposeful sample of white adventurers from the United Kingdom. However, it provides a provocative account of the psychology of expeditionary adventures and the perceived psychological benefits of extended, challenging experiences in natural environments.
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