Abstract

Recovery from stress and strain is a crucial and recurrent self-regulatory task in everyday life. We encounter stress and strain in numerous domains of daily life, most prominently via workplace, household, and family activities (Craig & Cooper, 1992; Fuller et al., 2003; Sluiter, van der Beek, & Frings-Dresen, 1999). This stress leads to a dysfunctional deviation from individual homeostasis and ability to maintain well-being, which may lead to individuals feeling “off balance,” fatigued, or unable to respond to new stressors (Demerouti, Bakker, Geurts, & Taris, 2009). People may recover from this stress via various activities and behaviors eliciting recovery experience (Sonnentag & Fritz, 2007; Sonnentag & Zijlstra, 2006). To researchers concerned with well-being and associated processes, therefore, how individuals manage recovery to return to homeostasis is a central concern.