Seeking relief or reward? A utilitarian-hedonic journey perspective on escapism

Purpose This paper aims to explores the escapist journey that consumers embark on to reduce self-discrepancy, from the motivation to satisfy personal goals to the fulfilment of these goals. Escapism is a powerful concept for understanding why and how people resolve a perceived self-discrepancy. Previous research has provided rich and diverse insights into the motivations and goals, experience contexts and outcomes that are associated with escapism. However, these notions have been explored in an independent, piecemeal fashion that has hampered the development of cohesive theoretical foundations. Design/methodology/approach The authors conduct a qualitative study, relying on 33 journeys derived from 20 in-depth interviews, to understand and explain how escapism is initiated, formed and relived. Findings The findings document the existence of a predominantly utilitarian and a predominantly hedonic model, articulating why and how consumers pursue distinctly different types of escapist journeys. Utilitarian escapism is primarily concerned with the need to avoid negative emotional states, prompting consumers to decide impulsively to engage into routinised experience contexts to find relief. Hedonic escapism is primarily concerned with the desire to achieve positive emotional states. It involves lengthy and thoughtful anticipation, promotes consumers to pursue experiences in out of the ordinary contexts, and is realised when consumers obtain reward. Research limitations/implications This study’s contributions present significant opportunities for further knowledge development. Practical implications The research findings have substantial practical ramifications for industry. Social implications Understanding people’s needs to avoid the stress of everyday life (i.e. utilitarian escapism) and their desires to seek out excitement and pleasure (i.e. hedonic escapism) has important societal implications. Originality/value This research provides a robust theoretical foundation for escapism, one that is applicable across multiple settings. Findings are anchored within existing theory to articulate the notions of utilitarian and hedonic escapism, explaining why and how consumers engage in markedly different escapist journeys.