Developing Wellbeing Capital: A Positive Tourism Approach

We are living in an era of major global conflicts, geopolitical upheavals, rising depression rates, and diminished global wellbeing. The time is ripe for accelerating and further developing global platforms of research knowledge focused on the creation of novel forms of capital, beyond financial capital. This research presentation will outline some pathways for building wellbeing capital in tourism and hospitality settings.  The last 20 to 25 years have seen a rapid raise of international research across different disciplines that emphasize optimal experiences, transcendent performance, excellence, positive deviance, psychological wellbeing and mental health.

In tourism research, one concept that aligns with this body of knowledge is the concept of positive tourism. Broadly, positive tourism is a study of psychological (hedonic and eudaimonic) human wellbeing and conditions for flourishing as they relate to individual tourists, members of host communities and tourism workers in diverse tourism sectors. Positive tourism research will first be discussed in the presentation under three broad pillars – 1) wellbeing of workers; 2) wellbeing of visitors, and 3) host community wellbeing. An overview will be presented outlining current gaps and future directions in the domain of positive tourism. Specific ideas for the development of wellbeing capital will then be outlined. New research directions will be delineated representing the global agenda for future research focused on creating wellbeing capital.