LEISURE AS A PROTECTIVE FACTOR FOR MENTAL HEALTH
Keywords:
leisure activities, mental health, protective factors, well-being, psychiatryAbstract
The role played by leisure in promoting well-being constitutes an important line of research into protective factors for mental health. In contemporary scientific literature, five different associations between leisure and mental health are identified: 1) decreased possibilities of access to leisure due to the presence of psychiatric disorders; 2) leisure activities as a rehabilitation tool for people with mental disorders; 3) leisure that causes boredom associated with drug use; 4) the benefits of leisure for promoting well-being; 5) and leisure activities as protective factors against psychological symptoms. One of the limitations of the biomedical and psychological models that support studies on leisure and mental health is that they take as a starting point the understanding of mental health as a variable related to the individual. There are, however, issues that transcend the individual and their personal life, relating to the ways in which sociocultural determinants overlap and interpenetrate to form a broader structure of community life. Furthermore, when thinking about risk and protective factors for mental health, one must understand what such factors mean in specific cultural contexts, an aspect also neglected in the reviewed literature. Therefore, this article seeks to understand leisure as a sociocultural activity that plays an important role in protecting people's mental health, through a critical review of studies in the field of so-called leisure studies, psychiatry and social sciences.
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