Emotional effects and meanings of water-based recreative experiences

Water areas, which are of a universal nature, are a key marketing area for the tourism industry as they present aesthetics and experiences. Water areas, which positively affect physical, mental, spiritual health and well-being, have become the main attractions of therapeutic landscapes. In this regard, tourists opt for landscapes with high emotional value, which brings water-based recreative experiences under the spotlight. These meaningful and valuable experiences shape the attitudes and behaviors of tourists and their perspectives on life. That said, the main purpose of this research is to investigate the emotional effects and meanings of water-based recreative experiences. To that end, this study created a model with the therapeutic landscape, emotional experience, well-being, and environmental behavior variables to determine the emotional effects and meanings of water-based recreative experiences. Research data were collected from 491 participants that have prior water-based recreative experiences, via Google Form using the survey method. The obtained data were analyzed through explanatory and confirmatory factor analyses, validity, and reliability analyses, as well as correlation analyzes. Moreover, regulatory and mediation analyzes were carried out using the Bootstrap technique with the Hayes 2019 v3.4 Process Macro plugin. The analyses yielded that therapeutic landscapes played a moderator role in the relationship between water-based recreative experiences and emotional experiences, and that emotional experiences had a mediation role in the relationship between water-based recreative experiences and well-being. Although the variables had positive correlations with each other, the model analysis showed that emotional experiences did not affect environmental behavior and did not act as a mediation variable in the relationship between water-based recreative experiences and environmental behavior. However, this research reveals that active participation in water-based recreative experiences can be potentially a predictor of well-being and environmental behavior. It is within this context that this research discussed the findings and offered various suggestions. Keywords: Water-based recreative experience, Therapeutic landscape, Emotional experience, Well-being, Environmental behavior