Can transformational tourism help solve the post-COVID mental health crisis?

Through­out his­tory our spe­cies has trans­formed where we’ve trav­elled, been trans­formed by travel, and trav­elled to trans­form. There is little doubt that many of us are hap­pi­est when we are on the move. Is tour­ism schol­ar Rohan Bhalla cor­rect in think­ing that our industry could be part of the solu­tion to the world’s men­tal health crisis? It’s a “Good Tour­ism” Insight. 

The coronavir­us pan­dem­ic has para­lysed the socioeco­nom­ic sys­tems of the world. At writ­ing, some soci­et­ies are mov­ing again while oth­ers con­tin­ue to be held host­age in lock­downs of vary­ing intens­ity, includ­ing my own nation of India. While much of the focus has been on COVID-19 and eco­nom­ic recov­ery, anoth­er silent and insi­di­ous pan­dem­ic has been tak­ing its toll. 

Mil­lions of con­firmed COVID-19 cases and related deaths have been repor­ted from more than 216 coun­tries and ter­rit­or­ies. Meas­ures like lock­downs, travel bans, and social dis­tan­cing have con­fined people to their homes and even left some stran­ded in for­eign lands. Fears of infec­tion, the loss of loved ones, uncer­tainty, and reduced social con­nec­tions have had dev­ast­at­ing effects on the men­tal health of people. Unem­ploy­ment, alco­hol­ism, domest­ic viol­ence, loan defaults, home­less­ness, and rap­id des­cents into poverty have upen­ded lives. 

All of these cas­cad­ing con­sequences of the pan­dem­ic have likely triggered chron­ic men­tal health issues among many people, which may very well bring more des­pair and death in the future than even COVID-19.

The Sec­ret­ary-Gen­er­al of the United Nations has writ­ten that tack­ling COVID-19 is the pri­or­ity for all coun­tries, but that the next steps would be to address the social prob­lems and for­mu­late eco­nom­ic recov­ery plans. How­ever, of all the social prob­lems, the health and well-being chal­lenges of deteri­or­at­ing men­tal health are among the more ser­i­ous and pose a great long-term threat. Per­haps the psy­cho­lo­gic­al after­math of the present pan­dem­ic will be long-lasting.

Also see Paul Rogers’ “GT” Insight
“Why build well-being into des­tin­a­tion resi­li­ence and tour­ism recovery?”

The coronavir­us pan­dem­ic has exposed men­tal health and well-being chal­lenges that the world has ignored for a long time. If fully accoun­ted for, men­tal ill-health would rep­res­ent a large pro­por­tion of the glob­al bur­den of dis­ease (MHIN [PDF hos­ted off­s­ite]). Depres­sion, anxi­ety dis­orders, schizo­phrenia, dys­thy­mia, and bipolar dis­orders are lead­ing causes of years lived with dis­ab­il­ity. Sui­cide is the second highest cause of pre­ma­ture mor­tal­ity in the world (WHO); around 800,000 lives lost and most of them are young people and older women (WHO).

The eco­nom­ic cost of men­tal health issues is also a sig­ni­fic­ant con­cern. Twelve bil­lion work­ing days are lost because of men­tal health issues every year (MHIN). Depres­sion and anxi­ety alone cost USD 1 tril­lion per year to the glob­al eco­nomy (WHO). Most coun­tries, par­tic­u­larly devel­op­ing and under­developed coun­tries, spend less than 1% of their total GDP on health­care (WHO). And a frac­tion of that is on men­tal health­care. For instance, India spends only 0.06% of its health budget on men­tal health pro­gram. And health­care only accounts for 1.2% of GDP.

Also see Larry Dwyer­’s “GT” Insight
“Tour­ism & hosts’ well-being: Mov­ing bey­ond GDP towards a bet­ter life”

Con­sid­er­ing the acute short­age of psy­cho­lo­gists, psy­chi­at­rists, psy­chi­at­ric nurses, and coun­sel­lors world­wide, there are ser­i­ous con­cerns about how to con­trol the silent pan­dem­ic of men­tal ill­ness which has only intens­i­fied dur­ing the coronavir­us pan­dem­ic. Present and future men­tal health chal­lenges demand non-phar­ma­ceut­ic­al inter­ven­tions that can mit­ig­ate the sever­ity of men­tal health anomalies. 

The ques­tion is, do we have any­thing avail­able to us that can help?

Transformational tourism might be helpful for mental health 

Jef­frey Kot­tler was the first per­son to use the term ‘trans­form­at­ive’ in rela­tion to tour­ism as he real­ised that travel has the poten­tial to provide thera­peut­ic inter­ven­tions, alter per­cep­tions, and ease the bur­den of liv­ing. Kot­tler found that travel clears men­tal fog, facil­it­ates decision-mak­ing, offers heal­ing from past exper­i­ences, expands the con­scious­ness, and instils a great­er appre­ci­ation of the good in life. 

Trans­form­a­tion­al tour­ism is eudai­mo­nia-based travel. Foun­ded on the psy­cho­logy of hap­pi­ness and emo­tion­al well-being, it can be used as a mech­an­ism for pro­mot­ing men­tal health and well-being; open­ing up a new spec­trum of well-being inter­ven­tions that will allow people to enhance their con­scious­ness and imbibe spir­itu­al experiences. 

Also see Ivana Dam­njan­ović’s “GT” Insight
“Travel, stor­ies, edu­ca­tion: The keys to happiness?”

In addi­tion to enhan­cing gen­er­al well-being, trans­form­a­tion­al tour­ism may offer a thera­peut­ic inter­ven­tion effect­ive against mild and mod­er­ate men­tal health prob­lems. The emer­ging field pos­sesses the poten­tial to help man­age the grow­ing men­ace of the men­tal health crisis. More research is needed.

Examples of trans­form­a­tion­al tour­ism products offer­ing poten­tial include eco­ther­apy and tra­di­tion­al prac­tices like shin­rin yoku (Japan­ese forest bathing), which lever­age nature as a cata­lyst for trans­form­a­tion. Work­shops in scen­ic land­scapes that allow one to pur­sue hob­bies also have a heal­ing qual­ity. Writ­ing and med­it­a­tion work­shops in the Him­alay­as and music­al events like the Sula Fest­iv­al in Nashik, India, also offer relief from stress for many people. For LGBTQ+ people who are vul­ner­able to men­tal health issues, an event tailored to them such as the Gay Ski Week in Queen­stown, New Zea­l­and may offer relief from the dis­crim­in­a­tion and trauma they may exper­i­ence in every­day life. 

Trans­form­a­tion­al tour­ism aligns the mind, body, and soul. As evid­enced by the examples I’ve offered above, it is not about recon­nect­ing with reli­gion or com­munity, although either might be use­ful for some people. It is about cent­ring one­self, explor­ing and know­ing one­self through intro­spec­tion, improv­ing con­nec­tion with one­self as well as one’s con­nec­tion to the world. Trans­form­a­tion­al tour­ism exper­i­ences may simply offer the time and space for life-chan­ging decision making. 

Tour­ism exper­i­ences that are developed with the express pur­pose of being trans­form­a­tion­al allow for self-explor­a­tion more than geo­graph­ic­al explor­a­tion or cul­tur­al explor­a­tion. As such they can be offered to domest­ic mar­kets and to those who can­not afford the time or expense to under­take long-dis­tance travel. 

Also see Tan­ner C Knor­r’s “GT” Insight
“Tour­ism infra­struc­ture, well-being, & how to ‘build back bet­ter’ for all”

All these char­ac­ter­ist­ics make trans­form­a­tion­al tour­ism a poten­tial rem­edy for men­tal health anomalies.

Transformational travel for well-being is not new

Trans­form­a­tion­al travel is not new. It is ancient. How­ever, it has evolved along with changes in civil­isa­tion, social struc­tures, demo­graphy, belief sys­tems, and lifestyle. 

For example, people of mod­ern soci­et­ies, par­tic­u­larly in urb­an envir­on­ments, often feel ali­en­ated and dis­con­nec­ted. Among those who can afford to, travel has always been an escape from that feel­ing; an oppor­tun­ity to ‘break free’. Indeed in many soci­et­ies, travel abroad has become a sec­u­lar rite-of-pas­sage for young people who want to ‘find them­selves’ or ‘find pur­pose’. Older adults too, who feel lost, depressed, or angry will (often unknow­ingly) ‘self-med­ic­ate’ with travel if they can afford it. 

Dur­ing troubled times, such as a pan­dem­ic in which free­dom of move­ment is cur­tailed, earli­er gen­er­a­tions might have taken refuge in the divine. Cur­rent gen­er­a­tions how­ever are more inclined to want to tear down the social con­structs that they believe lim­it their sense of per­son­al expan­sion. Yet their ulti­mate quest for mean­ing and pur­pose in life is identic­al. This quest is eas­ily under­taken through travel, so we should expect a surge when bor­ders reopen. 

The pro­spects for trans­form­a­tion­al tour­ism products that can help people heal and grow spir­itu­ally and emo­tion­ally are very pos­it­ive indeed. And, to the extent that can help com­bat future men­tal health and well-being crises, the very best of them may become use­ful items in the non-phar­ma­ceut­ic­al men­tal health­care kit.

What do you think? Share a short anec­dote or com­ment below. Or write a deep­er “GT” Insight. The “Good Tour­ism” Blog wel­comes diversity of opin­ion and per­spect­ive about travel & tour­ism because travel & tour­ism is everyone’s business.

Fea­tured image (top of post): Cocooned for now. Pre­par­ing to fly. Image by GLady (CC0) via Pixabay.

About the author

Rohan Bhalla is a Seni­or Research Fel­low and a PhD can­did­ate at the Depart­ment of Tour­ism and Hos­pit­al­ity Man­age­ment, Jamia Mil­lia Islamia, New Del­hi, India. A Gold Medal­list in Tour­ism and Man­age­ment Stud­ies, Mr Bhalla has pub­lished in journ­als and books around areas of his expert­ise, which include qual­it­at­ive research and multi-dis­cip­lin­ary approaches to real-time social sci­ences pro­jects. Rohan’s primary interests lie in philo­sophy, spir­itu­al­ity, trans­form­a­tion­al tour­ism, regen­er­at­ive tour­ism, rur­al tour­ism, and gender stud­ies. He also takes an interest in beha­vi­our­al sci­ences, emo­tion­al and spir­itu­al intel­li­gence, psy­cho­logy, com­mu­nic­a­tion, and per­son­al­ity devel­op­ment pro­grams. Rohan believes in the “trans­form­a­tion­al power of edu­ca­tion and the role of the teach­er as a mor­al propag­at­or of soci­ety to make the world a bet­ter place to live”.