The Use of the Internet as a Subjective Leisure Experience a Study of Australian University Students

This study examines Australian university students– use of the Internet as a subjective leisure activity. Conceptually, the findings indicated that the leisure dimensions established by Unger and Kernan (1983) are stable and consistent with the measurement of the concept of leisure. The leisure dimensions are convergently valid (with high correlationship) when regressed against items that measure the use of the Internet as a leisure activity. However, they do not seem to be nomologically valid. Some other interesting issues are also highlighted. First, students who use the Internet for leisure perceive it as a communication tool more than as a tool for entertainment such as participating in chat rooms and playing online games. Second, involvement emerged to be the best predictor of Internet as a leisure activity. Finally, students do not use the Internet as a shopping channel (only 19.4% have purchased online) or to gather information about products and services.