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About Psychology of Travel

What is the psychology of travel? The psychology of travel refers to the mental, emotional, and behavioral ways that people experience the act of traveling. It can include motivation, decisions during travel, managing stress when traveling, cultural influences and reactions, and the actions we take in planning and going on travels.

Learn everything you need to know about the psychology of travel by  clicking here for the Blog  Section of this site.  

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Travel Psychology on this Site

Psychology of Travel is not a site filled with tons of academic jargon and scholarly research articles. As much of a nerd as I am about that kind of research stuff, this site is about the enjoyment of travel.  It’s not a prescription or a psychological to-do list on your vacation.  This is also not a treatment guide for any mental health concerns.

It’s about relaxation, family time, soul-searching, overcoming fears, beauty, joy, culture, adventure and all the other magnificent things that make traveling one of our greatest endeavors.

So, while I can’t promise that I will never include interesting research articles, I do promise that I’ll do my best to only share the best ways to enjoy your traveling experiences…yes, with just a hint of psychology included to help out along the way! 

Why you Should Listen to Me

Travel is both a personal journey and a fantastic social adventure, and I do want you to know a little about my qualifications as to how you could benefit from reading these travel blogs.  More specifically, I’d like for you to know how this travel blog is  different  from the (literally) tens of thousands of travel blogs out there. 

The first question I usually get asked is, do you really have a doctorate degree in psychology?  Well, yes I really have earned a PhD in Clinical Psychology.  If I do the math, I essentially completed the 22nd grade.  Ugh.  

No psychology degree is needed to know that my wife was pretty glad when I finally graduated!

By connecting my training in psychology with my love for travel, we can develop ways to make every aspect of your travel experience more pleasurable, safe, and memorable.

Onward to the Travel Blog!

I write about almost all aspects of travel, and will of course touch on helpful mental health tips along the way.  There will be content for solo adventurers, family and group travelers, and those who quite frankly just don’t even know where to start.  I’m guessing that you fall into at least one of those categories.

I enjoy connecting with the travel community, including casual travelers, travel businesses and marketing experts, business travelers, ex-pats living abroad, and the travel blog community. There are certainly other travel experts out there, other psychologists as well, but I believe this site is unique in its combination of the mental aspects of travel and how I can help teach others to create the best travel experience  possible.

Thanks for visiting Psychology of Travel.  Check us out on Pinterest , Twitter , Facebook  and give a Follow while you’re at it.  

So what are you waiting for? Search below or check out the Psychology of Travel blog posts here!

Happy Travels,

-Dr. L, Founder of Psychology of Travel

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The Mind: Neuroscience and Psychology

Introduction.

What are the origins of our impulses to travel? Many scientists believe that the answer lies in the brain, and the way it is programmed. There are two dimensions to the way the mind influences our propensity to travel. First, we can explore through insights from neuroscience how physiological characteristics of the brain influence movement, and second, we can investigate how human psychology relates to travel.

I feel the need… the need for speed..   Maverick, Top Gun (1986), dir.Tony Scott

Key Aspects

Neuroscience, humans have unique neural mechanisms for movement.

Human babies are believed to follow the same chains of motor command as other animals, until they learn to walk, at which point we develop neural mechanisms that are unique in allowing us to co-ordinate complex movements. Professor Francesco Lacquaniti of the University of Rome believes that the co-ordination and maintenance of upright balance during human walking is more difficult than achieving balance during quadrupedal locomotion, and requires specific and complex neural pulses.

Our brains are wired to adapt to new forms of movement

Over the course of human social evolution, we have adapted rapidly to new forms of movement. As Stephen Gislason has explained ‘Ten thousand years ago… you learned to throw a spear, catch a fish or carry a deer carcass on your back. Today, you learn to throw a football, move a pen across a paper surface, push keys on a keyboard and control movement with a mouse or joystick.’

Our brains have a circadian rhythm and are wired for sunlight

Long distance travel can be disorientating, particularly if we cross multiple time zones in a short timeframe. We are wired to wake and work under sunlight: travel outdoors can therefore release endorphins and improve our feeling of well-being.

Our brains need travel for health

Movement benefits our mental health over the short and long term. But even inactive travel has benefits for the mind. According to Professor M C Diamond, novelty and challenge – such as we encounter when travelling – are two of five key elements needed for healthy brain ageing.

Travel, curiosity and creativity

Some scientists have described humans as ‘infovores’, noting that our curiosity, our need for new information, is related to release of chemicals in the brain that make us feel good. Other scientists have shown that our imagination and creativity can be increased by travel and even by the idea of travel or ‘psychological distance’ (Jia et al, 2009). It has been found that that spatial navigation, imagination and future thinking are all underpinned by a common set of ‘scene construction’ processes within the hippocampus. Perhaps the benefits of travel asserted by many cultures past and present – travel as an experience that broadens the mind – may have some neurological basis, lying within the ‘scene construction’ process of the hippocampus.

• Many journeys are not motivated by need but by desire. Sometimes we travel further than we need and we do not always seek to minimize economic costs.
• Cognitive psychology indicates that travel decision-making is complex, based on personality, perception and information processing.
• The aging process has significant effects on our propensity and psychological attitude towards travel. Older people tend to be less adventurous in their travel choices, preferring to use modes and visit destinations that are familiar.
• The emotions have a strong role to play in our travel choices. The sometimes competing feelings of pleasure, nostalgia, fear and freedom all affect our individual ideals of travel and the limits that we place on our movement. Perceptions of danger and safety, for example, can strongly affect the destinations we choose. One of the most common themes for anxiety dreams is the imagining of journeys gone wrong.

The use of traveling is to regulate imagination by reality, and instead of thinking how things may be, to see them as they are. Samuel Johnson, ‘Letter to Hester Thrale’ (1773)

Practical Implications

• Movement is hard wired into the human brain. Scientists argue that increasingly we should appreciate the benefits of movement as a human need.
• Humans can become psychologically distressed if their movement is restricted; hence confinement is commonly seen as form of a punishment. For mobility-disabled people the need for travel is often particularly important. Until recently most public transport was inaccessible to disabled people, resulting in their isolation and arrest of their full potential.
• The psychological motivations for travel are complex and differ between individuals, reflecting such factors as age, gender, emotions and experience.

Our style of locomotion, together with our cognitive abilities, probably was instrumental for evolving our style of social life. As for the other way around, that is, whether socialization plays a major role in the development of locomotion in human children, I really don’t know what to answer… the issue is wide open. Professor Francesco Lacquaniti, Atlantic Magazine (2011)

Further Reading/Resources

Hannaford, Carla  Smart Moves: Why Learning is not All in Your Head. (2000) Explains how movement can help cognitive development and learning

Harrison, Clearwater, and McKay (eds) From Antarctica to Outer Space: Life in Isolation and Confinement. ( 1991) Investigation into the way isolation and lack of movement affect the mind

Tony Hiss, In Motion: The Experience of Travel (2010) Enjoyable investigation of the psychology of motion and ‘deep travel’

Michael Brien – The Travel Psychologist: http://www.michaelbrein.com/index2.htm Readable popular introduction to the psychology of travel

Key Questions

How adaptable are we to new forms of movement? What role do the emotions play in our travel choices and behavior, and how can our transport systems incorporate these insights?

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clock This article was published more than  2 years ago

You’re a different person when you travel. Here’s why, and how to transform yourself at home.

Every so often, I pack a bag for a solo trip that lasts as long as I can manage. The lifelong habit has weathered career changes, a pandemic and marriage. “Where is your husband?” people ask. “Why are you here alone?”

“He’s at home,” I say, perhaps while splashing through leech-filled mudholes in Borneo. “Because I like traveling by myself.”

I’m after more than sightseeing. Family, home and work are magnetic poles in my life; at times, I need to consult my personal compass away from the strong pull that they exert. When I leave familiar things behind, I look at the world with fresh eyes. Strange foods become new favorites. Curiosity surges. I am a different person when I travel.

In her book, “ Getting Away from It All: Vacations and Identity ,” sociologist Karen Stein sheds light on the reasons that travelers, whether they’re going it alone or with friends, might feel different when on the road. She argues that travel is a chance to try out alternate identities — a temporary respite from ourselves.

Reading her book, I wondered: Can the psychology of travel help us take better, more transformative trips? Or even get a taste of transformation as the pandemic keeps us close to home?

First, I asked Stein to explain the strange power of going away. “Travel is a time that is sort of set aside from our everyday lives,” said Stein, who works at the consulting and research firm Abt Associates. “It can create a flexibility, both mental flexibility and flexibility of social structures, that allows us to see things in a different way, have different experiences or do things a little bit differently.”

Why the founder of Scott’s Cheap Flights wants you to take more vacations

In Stein’s view, people don’t have just one identity. Instead, they have many, a collection of possible selves that alternate and evolve over time. One version might be familiar to co-workers, another best suited to our roles as parents, children or friends.

Rituals of travel, such as packing a bag or grazing on oversalted airplane peanuts, signal that it’s time to put some of those quotidian selves on the shelf. Paralegals become paragliders, wind in their salt-bleached hair; English speakers give up the easy fluency of their native language and spend a week tripping over foreign phrases that any local child could pronounce.

And just as travel provides an opportunity to be someone different for a little while, some researchers argue that it also changes who you are upon returning home. Studies have found that travelers become more creative, open-minded and trusting, for example. A longitudinal study reported that university students were more open and agreeable — and less neurotic — after studying abroad, changes researchers attributed to relationships formed while traveling.

Neuropsychologist Paul Nussbaum, an adjunct professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine , said some of those benefits may be due to travel’s effect on brain health. “When you engage in something that’s novel and complex, your brain thrives,” Nussbaum said. Travel disrupts rote behaviors, forcing us to constantly adapt to less familiar environments. “We’re all sort of routinized animals; we do similar things in similar ways,” he said. “It’s when we get out of that and challenge ourselves that there’s a benefit to brain health.”

Even before the pandemic, though, Americans weren’t fully taking advantage of their opportunities to benefit from travel. In 2018, Americans with paid time off took an average of 17.4 days, leaving 768 million days of vacation time unused, according to research from the U.S. Travel Association, Oxford Economics and Ipsos. Predictably, the pandemic made things worse. In 2020, workers with paid time off used just 11.6 days overall, leaving about 33 percent of their vacation time on the table, the travel association said .

And those figures — already dismal when compared with other rich countries — exclude millions of Americans whose jobs don’t include paid time off. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics , in the leisure and hospitality industry, just 43 percent of workers had access to paid vacation in March.

Dissatisfied with cramming their trips into their busy lives and having limited vacation, some travelers are seeking longer journeys. Enter the grown-up gap year, a midlife version of the time some students take off before attending college.

It’s a chance for people to discover parts of themselves sidelined by career and family life, said Holly Bull, president of the Center for Interim Programs in Princeton, N.J., an opportunity to hop off “this track that people sort of see laid out ahead of them.” The counseling business she leads connects those would-be travelers with a breadth of possibilities, such as baboon research and language immersion.

‘Mental time travel’ is one of many imaginative ways we can cope with the pandemic

Bull saw a surge of interest in adult gap-year travel during the first year of the pandemic. And the rise of remote work — even before the pandemic — provides still more opportunities for extended travel. Programs such as Remote Year and WiFi Tribe , which offer logistical support and the security of a ready-made cohort for long trips abroad, have multiplied in recent years, and while the pandemic disrupted life for many remote workers at first, travelers are back to booking long journeys. One of Remote Year’s upcoming jaunts is a year-long trip that takes in five continents, with stops including Peru, South Africa and Indonesia.

Of course, hopping on a plane — or many planes — doesn’t mean you’ll find yourself. “Travel can be really transformative, but it’s not guaranteed,” said psychologist Jaime Kurtz, a professor at James Madison University and the author of “ The Happy Traveler: Unpacking the Secrets of Better Vacations .” Although spending a boozy week in Las Vegas or Cancún, Mexico, might express a side of your identity unfamiliar to family and co-workers, it’s not exactly a fast track to personal growth.

If you’re seeking meaningful trips with lasting effects, start by pushing yourself a little out of your comfort zone, Kurtz said, whether that means a cross-cultural experience or a challenging hike.

Slowing down can also help. “Take a bike tour or long walk, something that just allows you to look longer and deeper at things,” she said. Short-circuiting your fear of missing out, or FOMO, is key to the immersive travel experiences with the greatest effects, she added, because it’s hard to let it all sink in when you’re worried about what else you could be doing. “I’m a fan of places that have fewer things going on — fewer options, so you’re not overwhelmed by everything.”

Kurtz acknowledged that, with the delta variant surging, many travelers still aren’t comfortable with long journeys by air. Some are scrapping plans for the post-pandemic “revenge travel” that experts once forecast. And the pandemic isn’t the only thing causing travelers to rethink their vacation plans. The environmental cost of travel, a major contributor to the United States’ massive carbon footprint, is a concern, too.

But Kurtz said many of the benefits of travel can be found closer to home, with no checked bag required. “A lot of my work asks how we can savor everyday life the way we do when we travel,” Kurtz said. “I don’t think we realize how much of that we can find locally.”

Striking up a conversation with a stranger can channel the social discomfort of traveling, especially if you’re exploring a new-to-you neighborhood in your city or region. And Kurtz noted that spending time in nearby parks and natural areas can translate to a heightened sense of gratitude for the place you live.

In her earlier research, Kurtz also found that people become happier when they bring a popular travel hobby — taking photos of beautiful or meaningful things — to bear on their daily lives. Instead of snapping images quickly and moving on, Kurtz recommended pausing long enough to create a thoughtful picture you’ll value.

Even small changes matter. Try shaking up your routine by taking a different route to work, Kurtz said, or choosing a new-to-you cafe. Echoing Nussbaum’s advice, she said the most important thing is to sidestep a tendency to navigate through life on autopilot.

“When we go to a new place, our habits are interrupted,” Kurtz said. “That lesson from travel can enhance our lives.”

Smith is a writer based in Vermont. Her website is jenrosesmith.com . Find her on Twitter and Instagram : @jenrosesmithvt.

More from Travel:

Traveling alone isn’t for everyone — but for these adventurers, it’s the way to go

Amid the pandemic, an adventure addict finds solace in imagination

How we can overcome our covid conditioning and start traveling again

The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted travel domestically and around the world. You will find the latest developments at washingtonpost.com/coronavirus

Dr. Michael Brein, The Travel Psychologist

Travel psychology 101.

The Psychology of Travel Primer or, “Travel Psychology 101

There is no known theorized body of psychology that explicitly addresses questions of the psychology of travel. Of course there are some fundamental psychology 101 concepts that do apply, and these you will read below. Psychology, although a social science, still remains today an ‘art’ by which lay and scientific practitioners weave and create their explanations. Below, I weave my own fabric of explanations of the psychology of travel as they apply to the pop psychology of everyday travel and adventure.

1. Self-Esteem:  The majority of people tend to live very mundane lives. Anything they can do to enhance their own images of themselves elevates their estimates of their own sense of self worth in their own eyes and well as in the eyes of others. We all want to feel better about ourselves. To the extent that we can retrace, or reexperience the travels of others whom we hold in high regard enables us to feel in some way that perhaps we can identify with them, i.e., be more like them.

In some ‘magical thinking’ sense, by walking the walk and talking the talk, something of the rich and famous, and even the infamous, can ‘rub off’ on us in some way. Perhaps, in some way, we see ourselves as gaining some of the qualities of that master, soldier, statesman, artist or saint . . .

We also gain in self-esteem by gaining the respect and admiration of others who see that we have accomplished, retraced, reexperienced the adventures of these adulated people.

2. Achievement of Higher Order Needs:  For most travelers, the basic needs of sustenance, e.g., food, water, and so on are met. Higher order needs such as knowledge and achievement are often the rewards of travel. To this extent, if we can retrace the expeditions and adventures of historically famous adventurers before us, we can personally feel and experience the rewards of our own achievements. The more famous the adventurer, the more difficult the trek, the greater the challenge, the more sense of achievement we feel we accomplish by retracing the steps.

“Be all that you can be is the sense most of us have regarding difficult challenges and achievements.

3. Curiosity:  Perhaps the single greatest motivation or driving force serving the fulfillment of human needs is curiosity. Seeking new things, new experiences provides us with the means for satisfying our basic and higher order needs. We are very curious; in travel we seek new stimulation of all kinds. The search, drive or thirst for novelty, adventure and excitement are all in the service of reward and satisfaction. Travel is, of course, one of the best means for satisfying our curiosity: no other human endeavor provides us with the scope and variety of human experience across cultures.

4. Peak Experience:  We seek the peak experience, i.e., maximizing stimulation and passions afforded by the explosion of sights, sounds and fragrances of travel; seeking the mystical spiritual experience are all the means by which we seek to transform our often boring, mundane, uneventful existences back home.

5. Re-connecting / Re-validating Our Lives:  Travel enables us to make our current lives ‘more real’ by reexaming the present in light of the past. Thus, by retracing our ‘roots’, whether in a national or religious sense, for example by visiting places of our ancestors or by making religious pilgrimages or by revisiting famous historical or religious sights the vivid sensory experiences–the recreation of past to present tense enables us to ‘relate’ and re-identify. Re-connecting / Re-validating by visiting famous places or by retracing the steps of famous people adds to our sense and knowledge of reality by creating immediacy for us through our senses of what for us was merely mental imagery.

Perhaps T. S. Eliot’s famous poem illustrates this best:

We shall not cease from exploration And the end of all our exploring Will be to arrive where we started And know the place for the first time

6. Excitement and Adventure:  We seek the romantic; we seek excitement and we seek adventure. But what, really, is excitement? Adventure? To consider what excitement and adventure truly are, we need to consider that, for the most part, people are quite fearful of the unknown, wary of what is different, afraid of change, prone to culture shock. Is there a paradox here?

Interestingly, adventurous, romantic and exciting travel, is, to some extent, precisely so BECAUSE OF the element of discomfort, insecurity and potential danger. We seek romance, excitement and adventure TO A POINT just to the point of ‘danger’, so-to-speak . . . I use the word ‘danger’ in the sense as anything that tends to tip the balance of comfort, security, safety in the direction of discomfort, insecurity and risk, both psychological and otherwise . . . Of course, one person’s sense of adventure is another’s greatest phobia or fear. Riding the Zambezi River rapids is one person’s thrill and another’s white-knuckle near-death experience.

The balance between romance / adventure / excitement and culture shock / fear / discomfort is a fine line. I think travelers try to maximize their own sense of excitement and adventure by stretching the envelope, i.e., by experiencing all that they can experience, just short of where their fear factors lie. Excitement and adventure balanced against the fear of the unknown is probably the fundamental travel dynamic. Excitement may be defined, then, as coming as close to danger / discomfort / insecurity without actually being in danger…

To retrace the same adventures that famous explorers have done here-to-fore enables us to attempt to reexperience a bit of the unknown which was greater at the time but which is somewhat muted now hence adventurous but not quite so risky. It is easier to face climbing a mountain peak that has been breeched before than it is to face it for the first time.

7. Robert Frost wrote:

Two Roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both I took the one less traveled by . . .

By following in the retraced footsteps of the rich and famous and the infamous somewhat carefully re-orchestrated or re-choreographed steps of these others without the great fear of the unknown or without the great insecurities or dangers or cultural shocks we are able to experience these grand tours perhaps another variant of tours as in eco-tours or cultural safaris we are able to experience these semi-organized sorts of ‘adventure travels’ reasonably safely and assuredly. We don’t have to be the originators of these treks; we merely need to repeat them in order to reap the psychological bennies that fuel the human psyche…

What better way to max our curiosity, passion, adventure, excitement, romance and liking and understanding ourselves all the more for it while enhancing our lives in every way what better way than to follow in the safe and secure footsteps of people whom we admire and respect and who have been there, done that before what better way to stretch our own sense of adventure, excitement and resulting achievements by following the paths of those who came before us.

Dr. Michael Brein; 06/22/2006

* Dr. Michael Brein is The Travel Psychologist living on Bainbridge Island, Washington. He is an avid world-traveler as well as author, publisher and lecturer on a variety of travel subjects. His travel guide series, “Michael Breins Travel Guides to Sightseeing by Public Transportation may be viewed at www.michaelbrein.com. Michael Brein may be reached at [email protected] or 206.618.7618.

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Putting the Passion of Psychology Back into Travel

10 Things to Know About the Psychology of Travel & Adventure

Travel and adventure can be the perfect combination of medicine when it comes to mental health. Many of us feel a desire to travel…an impulse to be adventurous.  Neglecting these things can have us lacking some life changing feelings. Traveling allows us to fully live our lives, to expand our horizons, to conquer our fears, to establish our independence, and so much more. When it comes to understanding our inner psychology, this topic may not be the first thing you think of. However, it is possibly the easiest connection to make! It may be the connection that allows  you to live your life to its fullest.  

The desire for travel and adventure is deep rooted.

Circadian rhythms are the physical, mental, and behavioral changes that we experience each day. The rhythm is a daily cycle that responds to the physical light and darkness in our lives. To simplify, the amount of natural light and the amount of sleep we receive on a daily basis greatly affects our mental health and happiness.  When we feel a desire to travel and experience adventure, there is a reason. As primal humans, we may feel a physical desire to move our bodies and keep our brains active. We may feel an actual desire to explore and adventure. We need sunlight and warmth on our skin. We need to have new experiences. This is a part of our natural chemical makeup. It is satisfying…we are meant to explore. If we deprive ourselves of these experiences, our mental health may be affected.  

Disrupting our routines is good for our brains.

 Having routines is good for our brains. Routines help us with many things – from accomplishing our goals, to sleep schedules, to eating well. We create routines for a reason. However, we need to disrupt our routines sometimes. When we disrupt our ourselves, we are helping our brains. When we break a cycle that we have become way too comfortable with, we are living. Traveling and adventuring improves our cognition and allows us to reactivate our mental reward system. It also forces us to leave our comfort zones which can help with anxiety disorders and so much more! 

Traveling and adventuring helps us grow.

 When we travel and adventure, we are opening our minds. When we leave home, we learn about the world. This means new experiences and a look at cultures that are not our own. Exploring different worlds helps us grow tremendously. We are able to meet new people, try new foods, see different architecture, physically push ourselves in the outdoors…the list could go on and on! Traveling and adventuring also helps us grow by showing us different ways that people live. Regardless of if they choose that way of life or not. For example, poverty stricken countries. When we physically experience these lifestyles, we gain empathy and understanding. There is so much growth to find when we travel and adventure.  

The ways we travel and adventure are based on personality. 

Where we choose to travel and how we get there may be based on our personalities. The adventures that we take once we are there may also depend on our personalities. For example, a 22-year-old who just graduated with a Liberal Arts degree may not choose the same travel destination as the 65 year old man who loves to golf in his free time. The student may choose two weeks in Bali with nothing but their best friend and a backpack. They may be sleeping in yurts, learning to surf, and eating foreign foods. The 65 year old may have booked a trick to Palm Springs with their lifetime partner, a few suitcases with a variety of clothing, and an itinerary filled with the best restaurants and golf clubs. While there is absolutely nothing wrong with either of these trips, it is easy to understand that our adventures are based on who we are.  

Age can go both ways.

 Age can put us at different places on a psychological level. In regards to traveling, this can go either way! As we said before, this can change the types of traveling and adventuring that people do…but it can also change whether they even do it at all! As we age, sometimes traveling and adventuring can feel less desirable. Elderly people may not feel safe far away from home, their family, their doctors, etc. They also may not be able to go on as many adventures when they get to their destinations.  But on the other side of this…retirement! When people retire, they have a newfound freedom they haven’t experienced since childhood. Maybe they are finally in the right mental state to start traveling and adventuring!   

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Adventure and adrenaline go hand in hand. .

 Adrenaline is a natural hormone in our brains. It is produced by the adrenal glands and neurons that exist in the lower part of the brainstem. When adrenaline is produced, our heart rate increases, our blood pressure increases, the air passages in our lungs are expanded, the pupils in our eyes enlarge, and blood is redistributed to our muscles. Do you recognize this feeling? This feeling makes us feel alive. It makes us happy, it energizes us, and it satisfies us. We seek it out! You have probably felt it while adventuring!  

Traveling alone is a whole other prescription.

 There is an impressive amount of mental growth that can take place when traveling. When traveling alone, the opportunity for even more growth is exponential. Psychologically speaking, traveling and adventuring alone allows us to have experiences that we may never find if we were with a friend, a partner, or a group. When traveling alone someone may be able to establish personal independence. They may learn to trust themselves more, follow their gut in tricky situations, learn to enjoy their alone time, understand that it doesn’t take much to enjoy a place, and so much more.  

Traveling can inspire artistic qualities. 

 Ask any of the great artists and writers…travel and adventure are the perfect medicine. How many novels were written after exploring the great wide open? How many albums were finished after a writing trip to Bali? How many of your photography based coffee table books are scenes from traveling and nature? Traveling and adventuring can be inspiring. Whether you are already an artist or you have found a new hobby…traveling can bring out the creative side within all of us.  

The are many forms of travel and levels of comfort.

 While the idea of traveling sounds so luxurious and adventurous, it can also be strenuous and tiring. Getting to your destination is a part of the plan, too. Can’t forget that part. Ever had jet lag?  For some people, especially those not in the best health or those with children, obstacles like this could keep them from traveling at all. That psychological link is valid but there are also some tips that can help ease that mental state. For example, knowing yourself and what you need. Hate airplanes? Maybe plan a road trip. Can’t sleep in a tent? Maybe book a hotel! It also may be important for you to have things to pass your time while traveling to your destination. For example, books, music to listen to, coloring books, snacks and water, the proper medicine, etc.  

Traveling can make you appreciate things in a new way.

When the things we are so accustomed to are stripped from us, we appreciate them more. Traveling takes us out of our homes. It takes us out of our comfort zones. It strips away the things we are used to having every day. For example, our own bed, a shower any time of day, the security and safety of our own space, food that we are used to preparing or buying, wifi and power, an outlet that fits your cables, the correct type of money….the list could go on and on! While all of these differences are just a part of the adventure, they may make us appreciate what we are so used to in a new way.    Related Articles:

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Travel Psychology

What is travel psychology.

Travel Psychology is the study and application of how thoughts, feelings, and behaviors of individuals are influenced by travel experiences with their effects on individual and societal well-being.

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Help you design travel experiences and guide to cope with the challenges of life.

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Our journeys empower you to experience one-of-a-kind trip impacting wellness.

How does travel psychology work?

1. personalized insights.

Our Travel Psychologist customizes your journey based on your goals, motivations, and barriers, ensuring a perfect fit for your aspirations.

2. Crafting Itinerary

The Travel Psychologist collaborates with you, crafting a meticulously planned trip tailored to your interests, activities and destinations.

3. Pre-travel Support

Travel can bring about uncertainty. Our Experts equip you with intentions, strategies and actions to make your journey immersive.

4. On-travel Guidance

During trip, to encounter activities or simply need to talk, the travel psychologist is there to ensure you make the most of every moment.

5. Post-travel Integration

Our Travel Psychologist host post-travel sessions, aiding your reflection and integrating your experiences for personal growth.

Is Travel Psychology Relevant to My Situation?

The domain of Travel Psychology is applicable to various groups such as individuals traveling solo, couples, friends, families, travel companies, corporate organizations, and schools with collective purposes.

It can encompass various aspects such as travel choices, relationships, cultural purpose, life skill development, wellness goals, professional enactments, and introspective practices, all aimed at improving the quality of life.

R&D Travel Psychology

The l.e.g.i.t, travel psychology working model.

Created a groundbreaking approach in applied travel psychology. LEGIT model is able to elicit transformation across the range of ‘‘habits of mind’’ and relative importance of rational embodied processes. Developed the Tangible Travel Tool (TTT) for comprehensive assessment and evaluation.

Backed by UNWTO Initiative

Tourism for sustainable development goals.

Story of our Travel Psychologist

Why? Because we’ve been there.

Well, in part of life we have been through the similar dilemmas of constant thought about being lost and confused about who we were. Hustling with trying to create some sort of work-life balance. Not being sure about life decisions. Struggling to find meaningful work. Dealing with relationship challenges. And doing the whole existential crisis a.k.a. What the hell am I doing with my life kinda thing?

Unfortunately, it wasn’t good enough.

So we figured travel as a medium into intentional Journeys of fun, exploration, learning, and growth. We traveled unique cum common places looking for answers to many of life’s most confusing yet critical questions. And got engaged with new culture, ideology with constant awakening perspectives. Continued pushing ourselves out of comfort zones, took risks, and challenged us to move beyond our limiting beliefs to see what was really possible for us. We stood strong and positive, taking deep breaths day-by-day, minute-by-minute, we committed to taking simple yet powerful actions that brought us ever-closer to making our dreams a reality. And became the Travel Psychologist we had been looking for all along.

We would love nothing more than to support you in doing the same. 

Travel Psychology Resources

Article 370 in Kashmir: A Journey Through Travel & Culture

Plan a Retreat? Get Approved from Corporate Retreat Planner

The truth about Mental Health in Wellness Resorts

Growth Story: What happens on our Mental Wellness Retreat

Travel Anxiety: Your Journey to Calm with Travel Psychologist

Stressed AF? The Science Tested Guide To Travel Therapy

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Travelers may find it difficult to empathize with locals, according to experts. Here, tourists in 2016 buy fruit juice at a market stall in Siem Reap, Cambodia.

Travel is said to increase cultural understanding. Does it?

While researchers say travel does affect the brain’s neural pathways, true empathy remains an elusive destination.

Empathy is commonly defined as “putting yourself in another person’s shoes” or “feeling the emotional states of others.” It’s a critical social tool that creates social bridges by promoting shared experiences and producing compassionate behavior. But can empathy be learned? And can travel help facilitate this learning? The answer is complicated. “Research has shown that empathy is not simply inborn, but can actually be taught,” writes psychotherapist F. Diane Barth in Psychology Today . While past research has indicated that empathy is an unteachable trait, newer research—including a 2017 Harvard study —suggests that the “neurobiologically based competency” of empathy is mutable and can be taught under the right circumstances. Whether seeing the world actually opens travelers’ minds—that it makes travelers more empathetic—is up for debate. In a 2018 Harris Poll of 1,300 business travelers, 87 percent said that business trips helped them to be more empathetic to others, reports Quartz . And in a 2010 study , Columbia Business School professor Adam Galinsky found that travel “increases awareness of underlying connections and associations” with other cultures. While self-defined empathy and awareness are unreliable measurements, it stands to reason that cross-cultural exposure through travel would at least create conditions for checking conscious and unconscious biases. “If we are to move in the direction of a more empathic society and a more compassionate world, it is clear that working to enhance our native capacities to empathize is critical to strengthening individual, community, national, and international bonds,” writes Helen Riess, associate professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and author of the 2017 report.

But the coronavirus pandemic and, more recently, the global Black Lives Matter protests have forced an uncomfortable reckoning—that all the travel in the world might not be enough to engender the deep cross-cultural awareness people need now.

“There’s this false adage that travel opens minds, but that’s not [a built-in] fact about what travel does,” says Travis Levius, a Black travel journalist and hospitality consultant based in London and Atlanta. “Travel does not automatically make you a better person,” nor does it clue you into “what’s going on in terms of race relations.”

Black Travel Alliance founder Martina Jones-Johnson agrees, noting that tourism boards have made it “overwhelmingly clear that travel doesn’t necessarily build empathy.”

The lack of diversity within the travel industry itself suggests that there’s much work to be done to make the industry as inclusive as the world of travel consumers. According to a 2019 annual report by the U.S. Commerce Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics, workers in the leisure and hospitality industry were overwhelmingly white. Consumers, meanwhile, say they want to spend their money on travel companies whose employees reflect the world they work in, according to the World Travel and Tourism Council .

Additionally, companies that embrace inclusivity may have a better chance of avoiding tone-deaf messages , such as using “free at last”—the line is from Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Dream” speech—to caption a billboard depicting white children jumping into the Florida Keys. The advertisement, which has since been taken down, launched in the wake of the killing of George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis that sparked worldwide protests against police brutality.

(Related: Learn why it’s important to have diverse perspectives in travel.)

Karfa Diallo leads a tour of sites related to the trans-Atlantic slave trade in Bordeaux, France, in June 2020. Participating in activities that amplify marginalized voices and experiences can go a long way toward developing empathy, say experts.

A road paved with good intentions

Interestingly, modern tourism has fairly empathic origins. In the 1850s, Thomas Cook used new railway systems to develop short-haul leisure travel as respites for hard-working British laborers, according to Freya Higgins-Desbiolles, a senior lecturer on tourism management at the University of South Australia.

A hundred years later the United Nations declared reasonable working hours, paid holidays, and “rest and leisure” as human rights . By the 1960s, spurred by related movements to increase holiday time, the leisure sector had coalesced into a full-fledged professional industry.

Since then, the World Tourism Organization and international aid groups have championed tourism as both “a vital force for world peace [that] can provide the moral and intellectual basis for international understanding and interdependence,” as well as an economic development strategy for poorer nations.

But not everyone agrees that the travel industry has lived up to these lofty goals. In recent decades, it has been accused of doing just the opposite. As Stephen Wearing wrote nearly 20 years ago : “tourism perpetuates inequality” because multinational corporations from capitalist countries hold all the economic and resource power over developing nations.

(Related: This is how national parks are fighting racism.)

These days, inequality is baked into the very process of traveling, says veteran Time magazine foreign correspondent and Roads & Kingdoms co-founder Nathan Thornburgh. “Your frequent flier status, the stupid little cordon separating the boarding lines, the way you take an Uber or cab from the airport after you land, not a bus or colectivo or matatu —those all reinforce divisions, not empathy,” he writes in an email. “And that’s just getting to a place.”

Empathy’s downsides

Experts say developing empathy isn’t easy and comes with a host of problems. Joseph M. Cheer, a professor at Wakayama University’s Center for Tourism Research in Japan, notes that empathy inherently “others” another person.

In his 2019 study of westerners on a bike tour in Cambodia, Cheer found that despite the prosocial aspects of the experience—visiting local non-governmental organizations, interacting with local Cambodians—post-tour interviews revealed that the tourists didn’t understand the cultural context of the outing. The visitors leaned into problematic tropes like “happy,” “lovely,” and “generous” when describing locals or simply saw Cambodians as service providers.

This “othering” bias, Cheer says, becomes more noticeable the greater the distance between tourists and locals, and especially so in strictly transactional encounters, such as in hotels.

A worker at a resort in Bali. Researchers say visitors should make a commitment to understand local cultures by moving past transactional interactions.

Our individual travel experiences oppose our best intentions, says travel writer Bani Amor, who has written extensively on race, place, and power.

“The stated [positive] intentions are completely contradictive to what happens in the tourism industry and how oppressive it is to BIPOC [Black, indigenous, and people of color] around the world, how tourism laborers are being treated, and how they’re being dispossessed, not having a right to their own land and to enjoy our own places,” says Amor, who has worked in the tourism industry in their ancestral home of Ecuador.

“You can only really know your own experience,” adds Anu Taranath, a racial equity professor at the University of Washington Seattle and a second-generation immigrant.

“I think we can develop empathetic feelings and sort of crack open our sense of self to include other people’s experiences in it. We can only deepen our own understanding of who we are in an unequal world and how that makes us feel and how that motivates us to shift our life in some way or another.”

I think in its purest form, empathy is basically impossible. I can weep for you, but I can’t weep as you. Nathan Thornburgh , founder, Roads & Kingdoms

Or as Thornburgh puts it: “I think in its purest form, empathy is basically impossible. I can weep for you, but I can’t weep as you.”

Traveling deeper

While experts conclude that travel may not inspire enough empathy to turn tourists into social justice activists, the alternative—not traveling at all—may actually be worse.

“[B]ecause travel produces encounters between strangers, it is likely to prompt empathetic-type imaginings, which simply wouldn’t be there without the proximity created by travel,” says Hazel Tucker in a 2016 study published in the Annals of Tourism. It’s also one reason why it’s important to expose children to travel at an early age.

Yet truly transformational experiences require more than just showing up with a suitcase. It requires energy, effort, and commitment on the part of tourists, as well as specific conditions, says Higgins-Desbiolles. “Visitors need to be prepped for the interaction so that they are ready to engage with the people on an equal level,” she notes.

Taranath’s book Beyond Guilt Trips: Mindful Travel in an Unequal World may provide some starting points. “It’s an invitation to think more carefully about our good intentions and where they really need to be challenged,” Taranath explains. “How do you think about identity and difference in an unequal world? What does it actually look like?”

Additionally, Tucker suggests embracing what she calls “unsettled empathy”: learning about the cultures you’re planning to visit and sitting with uncomfortable legacies of colonialism, slavery, genocide, and displacement from which no destinations are exempt.

Barbara Manigault, a Gullah sweet grass basket weaver, practices her craft in Mount Pleasant, South Carolina. American tourists with limited travel opportunities can find many places in the U.S. to learn more about other cultures.

That background can be the basis for meaningful conversations, which Cheer found are “the key element that prompted empathy.” Thornburgh adds that travelers should seek out places where there is “an equal and humanistic exchange, or something approaching it, between the visitors and the visited.”

(Related: The E.U. has banned American travelers. So where can they go? )

Toward that end, experts generally ruled out cruises. Instead, immersive experiences like Black Heritage Tours that amplify historically marginalized voices provide better opportunities for meaningful connections.

Fortunately for would-be travelers, those opportunities can be found even in these pandemic times, when many countries are restricting international travel, especially for Americans.

“We are so lucky in this country that the whole world has come here to build their lives, in big cities and small, and that we have Black and [Native American] communities throughout,” says Thornburgh. “Go to their restaurants, lend your talents to their schools, help them raise money for their playgrounds.

“You want travel? You want to experience different cultures? Start at home. Start now.”

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How to Stay Calm When Your Trip Goes Wrong

If the road gets bumpy, try these mindfulness techniques..

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Author David Gelles says mindfulness can help you deal with the inevitable uncertainty that comes with travel.

Courtesy of Cros Studios/Stocksy United

Planes get delayed, reservations blundered, restaurants overbooked. Sometimes it even rains on your only beach day. “Travel inherently involves uncertainty,” says David Gelles, author of Mindful Work: How Meditation Is Changing Business from the Inside Out . “Mindfulness can make us more comfortable with that uncertainty.”

The practice of mindfulness—focusing on the present moment without trying to change it—is rooted in centuries-old Buddhist traditions. But in recent decades, Western medicine and psychology have acknowledged its benefits on emotional well-being. Studies have shown that practicing mindfulness helps reduce stress and anxiety and can even contribute to improved memory, focus, and emotional flexibility. But some people still understand “mindfulness” as an empty buzzword—or as an intimidating spiritual journey that requires years of devotion in order to derive any real results. “Mindfulness is a capacity that anyone can develop,” says Holly Rogers, a psychiatrist who helped create the Koru Mindfulness program specifically for young adults. “But you have to practice. It’s just like lifting weights.” So what techniques can we use to channel mindfulness when travel mishaps occur? Here’s where to start.

To stay calm in tough travel situations, try meditating or finding small sources of comfort.

Courtesy of Spring Fed Images/Unsplash

Take daily moments to meditate

Whether in your hotel room or on a public park bench, find a comfortable place each day where you can close your eyes and practice meditation. “It’s about [taking] short moments, many times,” Gelles says. “Apps like Headspace , Calm , 10% Happier , and Insight Timer are all great entry points for developing the habit.” The idea of meditation is to gradually train your mind to be present and in tune with the moment. “Feel your senses,” Gelle says. “What does it sound like where you are? What does it smell like? It takes practice, but even just a few minutes a day is enough to start changing the way we think.”

Find your motto

“A gatha is a series of phrases [or mantras] that you repeat in your mind, linked to the rhythm of your breath,” says Rogers. If a canceled flight leads to botched trip plans, the solution to your stress can start with just a few simple sentences. Rogers recommends the gatha “acceptance reduces suffering” to help you calm down when flustered. Focus on breathing deeply while reciting the gatha of your choice. The point, Rogers says, is to “try to let go of frustrations about what has already happened or worries about what might happen in the future.”

Seek small sources of comfort

“One of the main principles of mindfulness is that most of our suffering is caused not by what happens to us, but instead by what our mind does with what happens to us,” Rogers says. For this reason, it can be helpful to seek out specific sources of comfort on the road—especially for travelers with common anxieties such as a fear of flying or anxiety in large crowds. A favorite travel pillow won’t make a turbulent flight less bumpy, but it might enhance your sense of serenity until the storm has passed. Identify what soothes you in moments of stress, and consider it an act of self-care to pursue what brings you solace without shame.

Have a backup plan

Imagine lousy weather at Machu Picchu fogs out your postcard-perfect view, or the Paris museum you’re most excited to explore is closed for renovation during your visit. When you can’t complete your travel “to-do list,” pursue a plan B. “Rather than get caught up in wanting things to be different than they are, [mindfulness is] about recognizing that we’re faced with one reality, and it’s our choice whether that is one we embrace,” Gelles says. Try checking out a lesser-known museum in a nearby neighborhood or wandering down a hiking trail you might not have noticed otherwise. “Mindfulness isn’t about not having expectations,” Gelle says. “What’s important is that we recognize that our expectations are not the determinants of whether or not we have a satisfactory experience. After all,” he continues, “travel, at its best, is not about checking off boxes.”

But if it’s a flight delay or cancellation we’re talking about, arm yourself with the knowledge of what next steps you need to take—so you’re ready to spring into action after you’ve found your zen. >>Next: 9 Essential Tips to Help You Get Better Sleep on a Plane

This story was originally published in 2019; it was most recently updated with new information on May 6, 2024.

Sorry, but Science Says You Should Not Sleep In on Weekends

Social jet lag from changing wakeup times can have the same effect as travel..

Posted May 3, 2024 | Reviewed by Tyler Woods

• Why Is Sleep Important?
• Find a sleep therapist near me
• Changing wake up time affects circadian rhythms.
• This "social jet lag" alters physiology in a way similar to travel jet lag.
• Physical activity can help offset some, but not all, negative effects of changes in sleep timing.

Ever since I was writing Becoming Batman back in the mid-2000s and I was exploring the idea of what a nocturnal lifestyle would actually do to a human body, I got interested in what we now call “sleep hygiene," which is why a recent paper on sleep timing and the effects of “social jet lag” caught my eye.

I Wasn't Worried About Batman’s Bedtime

What fascinated me was what changing sleep patterns actually did to your body and brain, so much so that I wound up shifting my own personal practices to get away from something I'd done for a long time. And that something was a very common thing a lot of us do—try to catch up on the weekends by sleeping in.

I always felt kind of off when I did that. Later, I realized I felt kind of like I did when traveling and having jet lag. Regardless, I did it anyway but eventually I changed my wake up time to be the same every day of the week. This was mostly to align with my morning martial arts training regimen, but I began to notice I felt a lot better.

The reason I felt a lot better turns out to be due to something called “social jet lag.” It has been known for some time that changing your sleep patterns on the weekend does have an impact on the rest of your weekend. But it's only recently that the mechanisms underlying this have been discovered. This is why I found a recent paper published to be very interesting. It's in mice, and the extension to humans needs to be established, but the basic principles are likely very similar because mechanisms of something critical like sleep regulation are typically evolutionarily conserved across species.

Wake up and get out of bed, but do more than drag a comb across your head

Ambient light levels and physical exercise are both powerful factors for resetting and entraining our circadian rhythms . Both of these can be disrupted by changes in wake-up times that might occur in real “jet lag” from travel to a different part of the world or as induced by altering sleep hygiene deliberately. Michael Dial and colleagues at the University of Nevada were interested in the role that physical activity could have in altering such health problems as blood glucose regulation, body weight control, and diabetes. To truly control all the factors as much as possible, they used a mouse model .

Dial and colleagues assigned mice to four groups of exercise or sedentary and with social jet lag or consistent wake times. As a bit of a bonus for the mice in the social jet lag group, they were given a simulated three-day weekend and allowed a four-hour wake-up delay before reverting back on "Monday."

They tested fitness on a graded wheel running protocol, assessed blood glucose tolerance, and measured muscle genetic clock mitochondrial functioning before and after a six-week intervention. The mice in the sleep-in group had impaired physical fitness, glucose handling, and body weight regulation.

Physical activity helped offset some of the negative effects of sleeping in, but not completely. The overall conclusion from this work is that regular alteration of wake-up timing "blunted cardiometabolic adaptations to exercise and that proper circadian hygiene is necessary for maintaining health and performance." Just like physically-induced jet lag, "social jet lag seems to be a potent circadian rhythm disruptor that impacts exercise-induced training adaptations."

Your brain cares most about when you wake up

All of this aligns with my own experiences since deciding to maintain my wake-up time no matter where I go or what time zone I'm in. The light cues and levels of physical activity, evolutionary signals telling your brain and body that you're alive and moving around, are the main drivers of anchoring our circadian rhythms and our daily functioning levels. So I just try to get right back on the horse and do my normal thing the very next day I arrive somewhere as I do wherever and whenever I am. It's a bit tiring on the first day, but it seems to help when traveling and for daily functioning while staying in place.

Of course, no matter what you do, events can conspire against you. Social jet lag is actually forced upon citizens of every country that participates in the ridiculous "changing of the clocks" between daylight and standard time twice per year. Regardless of what Taylor Swift, who proclaimed "jet lag is a choice," says, we can't just choose not to believe in social or travel jet lag.

Dial MB, Malek EM, Cooper AR, Neblina GA, Vasileva NI, Hines DJ, McGinnis GR. Social jet lag impairs exercise volume and attenuates physiological and metabolic adaptations to voluntary exercise training. J Appl Physiol (1985). 2024 Apr 1;136(4):996-1006. doi: 10.1152/japplphysiol.00632.2023. Epub 2024 Mar 7. PMID: 38450426

E. Paul Zehr Ph.D., is a sensorimotor neuroscientist and a martial artist of Okinawan, Japanese, and Chinese traditions. His books include Becoming Batman, Inventing Iron Man , Project Superhero , and Chasing Captain America .

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