Curiosity-tourism interaction promotes subjective wellbeing among older adults in Japan

The study addresses how tourism relates to subjective wellbeing among older adults, considering personality traits—specifically epistemic curiosity—and financial constraints. In aging societies, enhancing subjective wellbeing may help older adults positively accept age-related changes and protect cognitive health. Prior work suggests tourism relates to quality of life, but whether higher travel frequency improves subjective wellbeing and how personality motivates travel is unclear. Curiosity, defined as a drive for cognitive stimulation, may motivate tourism and be associated with subjective wellbeing. The authors hypothesize that curiosity predicts travel preference and subjective wellbeing in adults in their 60s, that travel frequency positively correlates with subjective wellbeing even after accounting for curiosity, and that family budget moderates these relationships.

• Young seniors (people in their 60s) are growing in proportion in Japan and are frequent, capable travelers; promoting wellbeing in this group may protect against dementia and functional decline.
• Tourism and wellbeing: Travel involves cognitively engaging and socially rich activities that can enhance life satisfaction and positive affect. Although many studies detail who travels and how travel experiences affect wellbeing, fewer examine whether travel frequency per se relates to higher wellbeing. Hypothesis 1: Frequent travelers have better subjective wellbeing than less frequent travelers.
• Seniors as a marketing target: People in their 60s often have more leisure time and are healthier than those over 70, making them a prime group for travel promotion in Japan.
• Travel motivation: Classic socio-psychological motives include escape, self-exploration, relaxation, prestige, regression, kinship, social interaction, novelty, and education. Personality traits (e.g., allocentrism/psychocentrism, novelty-seeking) influence destination preferences and tourism involvement.
• Curiosity: Epistemic curiosity (diverse vs specific) motivates seeking knowledge/experience. Diverse curiosity drives broad exploration of new information; specific curiosity drives targeted information seeking to resolve cognitive conflict. Curiosity has received little attention as a travel motivator. Hypothesis 2: Frequent travelers show higher epistemic curiosity than less frequent travelers.
• Personality and wellbeing: Personality is a strong determinant of subjective wellbeing. Novelty-seeking shows stronger direct effects on life satisfaction than indirect effects via tourism experiences. Curiosity relates to wellbeing through knowledge maintenance. Hypothesis 3: Curiosity positively correlates with subjective wellbeing. Hypothesis 4: Travel frequency positively correlates with subjective wellbeing even after controlling for curiosity (testing bottom-up effects of travel).
• Income moderation: Since tourism requires resources and income relates to happiness, financial situation may moderate the curiosity–travel–wellbeing links. Hypothesis 5: Family budget situation alters these relationships.

Design: Cross-sectional questionnaire survey conducted June 2017 (pre-COVID-19). Participants: Japanese customers aged 59–69 registered with a travel agency were invited. Of 1068 respondents, 233 were excluded due to incomplete data, yielding n=835 (male=437). Mean age 64.73 ± 2.79 years. Measures:

• Trait curiosity: 12-item Epistemic Curiosity Scale (Nishikawa & Amemiya, 2015), 5-point Likert (1–5), with two 6-item subscales: diverse curiosity and specific curiosity. Items administered in Japanese.
• Subjective wellbeing: Japanese Subjective Happiness Scale (SHS), 4 items, 7-point Likert-type (1–7) assessing cognitive and affective components.
• Travel frequency: Self-reported frequency categories: (1) >10 times/year; (2) 5–9; (3) 3–4; (4) 1–2; (5) once in 2–3 years; (6) less than once in 2–3 years (hardly ever). Used as nominal for group comparisons (H1, H2) and ordinal for correlations/mediation.
• Subjective family budget situation: 5-point scale from Extremely good to Extremely bad; recoded into three groups: (1) Extremely/Moderately good; (2) Neither good nor bad; (3) Moderately/Extremely bad (used for H5 moderation analyses). Procedure: Participants provided informed consent. Ethics approval: Tohoku University (No. 2018-1-740). Statistical analyses:
• Group differences: Nonparametric tests (e.g., Kruskal–Wallis) and t-tests where appropriate.
• Mediation/moderation: SPSS PROCESS macro (Hayes, 2018) with 10,000 bootstrap resamples to estimate indirect effects. Mediation models assessed relationships among diverse curiosity, specific curiosity, travel frequency, and SHS. Family budget moderation tested by stratified mediation analyses across three budget groups.

Sample characteristics: Men were older and had higher SHS than women (age t-test p<0.001; SHS p=0.017). No sex differences in epistemic curiosity, travel frequency, or family budget. Hypothesis 1 (travel frequency and wellbeing): Supported. Those traveling ≥5 times/year had higher SHS than those traveling ≤2 times/year (Kruskal–Wallis p<0.001; see Fig. 1/Table 3 for significant pairwise differences). Hypothesis 2 (curiosity and travel frequency): Supported, driven by diverse curiosity. Participants traveling ≥10 times/year showed higher diverse curiosity; Kruskal–Wallis for diverse curiosity p<0.001; for specific curiosity p=0.012 (no significant post-hoc pairwise differences). Mediation showed the apparent effect of specific curiosity on travel frequency was fully mediated by diverse curiosity: after controlling for diverse curiosity, specific curiosity no longer predicted travel frequency; indirect effect B = -0.182, SE = 0.0349, 95% CI [-0.2505, -0.1143]. Hypothesis 3 (curiosity and wellbeing): Supported. Diverse curiosity positively correlated with SHS; mediation indicated specific curiosity’s relation to SHS was mediated by diverse curiosity. After controlling for diverse curiosity, specific curiosity did not predict SHS. Indirect effect B = 0.211, SE = 0.0343, 95% CI [0.1432, 0.2778]. Hypothesis 4 (travel frequency predicts wellbeing beyond curiosity): Supported. In mediation with diverse curiosity as predictor, travel frequency as mediator, SHS as outcome: diverse curiosity predicted more frequent travel (B = -0.228, SE = 0.0353, p<0.001; lower numeric value indicates higher frequency), and more frequent travel predicted higher SHS (B = -0.125, SE = 0.0322, p<0.001). Indirect effect significant (reported as B = 0.286, SE = 0.0089, 95% CI [0.0127, 0.0475]); direct effect of diverse curiosity on SHS remained significant (B = 0.266, SE = 0.0336, p<0.001). Hypothesis 5 (family budget moderation): Supported. Across budget strata:

• Extremely/Moderately good: Diverse curiosity → SHS total effect significant; travel frequency → SHS significant; indirect effect via travel not clearly significant (reported 95% CI included zero: Indirect effect 0.0217, SE 0.0157, 95% CI [-0.0015, 0.0588]).
• Neither good nor bad: Diverse curiosity → travel frequency (B negative, p<0.01) and travel frequency → SHS (B negative, p<0.05) significant; indirect effect significant (B = 0.0206, SE = 0.0100, 95% CI [0.0026, 0.0419]); direct effect of diverse curiosity on SHS remained significant.
• Moderately/Extremely bad: Diverse curiosity predicted SHS, but not travel frequency; travel frequency was not related to SHS; indirect effect not significant (B = -0.0227, SE = 0.0270, 95% CI [-0.0812, 0.0297]). Additional observations: Table 3 shows significant differences across travel-frequency groups for SHS (p<0.001), total epistemic curiosity (p<0.001), and diverse curiosity (p=0.012).

Findings demonstrate that diverse curiosity is a key intrinsic motivator for travel among older adults and independently relates to higher subjective wellbeing. Travel frequency is positively associated with subjective wellbeing even after accounting for curiosity, indicating both top-down (trait curiosity) and bottom-up (tourism participation) influences on wellbeing. Specific curiosity does not motivate travel once diverse curiosity is considered and may even attenuate travel interest, suggesting that an individual’s balance between diverse and specific curiosity could shape their optimal travel frequency. Travel likely contributes to wellbeing by providing cognitively stimulating, varied, and socially engaging experiences, aligning with cognitive reserve perspectives. However, financial constraints moderate these benefits: when family budgets are tight, curiosity does not translate into travel, and travel frequency does not relate to wellbeing, implying that tourism’s wellbeing benefits are contingent on affordability. These results suggest targeted interventions—encouraging travel among those with high diverse curiosity and adequate means, and offering financial support where needed—may most effectively enhance wellbeing in older adults.

The study shows that diverse curiosity motivates travel in early seniors (people in their 60s) and that more frequent travel is associated with greater subjective wellbeing, beyond the influence of curiosity. Tourism thus has potential to support wellbeing during aging. However, high specific curiosity may limit the benefits of frequent travel for some individuals, and financial constraints can block both the motivation to travel and the wellbeing gains from travel. Interventions should consider personality fit and affordability, including social tourism initiatives to extend benefits to financially constrained older adults. Further research should incorporate additional factors such as interpersonal dynamics, travel quality (destinations, companions, duration), and changing social conditions (e.g., post-COVID environments).

• Sampling: Participants were registered customers of a travel agency, likely more travel-inclined than the general population, limiting generalizability.
• Age range: Restricted to individuals in their 60s; relationships may differ in later old age due to health, socioeconomic changes, or shifts in curiosity.
• Measurement of travel: “Travel/tourism” was self-interpreted; motivations like social media-driven approval were not assessed; travel quality factors (destination, satisfaction, companions, duration) were not included.
• Potential confounders: Leisure time, family responsibilities, health care needs, and interpersonal relationships with companions may affect both travel and wellbeing but were not modeled.
• Design: Cross-sectional, self-reported measures; mediation analyses do not establish causality.
• Cultural and temporal context: Conducted in Japan before COVID-19; cultural factors and pandemic-related changes in travel behavior may affect applicability.