What Is a Lifestyle?
A lifestyle is the way in which a person lives. It includes their daily activities and habits, including their work and leisure time. It also includes their views on politics, religion, relationships and health. People often try to find ways to live the best lifestyle possible. In order to do this, they may try to have a healthy diet, exercise regularly and avoid smoking and alcohol. They may also try to find a balance between work and home life. Some people may even look for lifestyle benefits like vacations, a new house or a more expensive car.Many different definitions of a lifestyle have been proposed in the literature. Some have focused on the internal aspect of lifestyle, while others have emphasised the external dimension. Some of these concepts are well known in the literature, such as those of Rokeach, who linked lifestyle with values and attitudes, and those of Weber and Bourdieu.In the latter, lifestyles were seen as socially constructed and dynamically influenced by both static and dynamic forces at a sociocultural level. For example, a city resident’s lifestyle might be influenced by cultural and economic factors, such as the availability of cultural events or their proximity to natural attractions. On the other hand, a suburban or rural resident’s lifestyle might be influenced by environmental and economic factors, such as the amount of open space available or the quality of local schools.More recently, the concept of lifestyle has been incorporated into various theories and research areas. For instance, a lot of lifestyle research is related to the field of public health, where researchers are interested in understanding and influencing the behaviours that lead to poor health outcomes such as obesity and cardiovascular disease. However, a common tendency within this research is to focus on behavioural components of a lifestyle and neglect the psychological, identity and temporal dimensions.Other researchers have defined a lifestyle in terms of consumption and related social processes. This approach has largely been associated with sociological currents such as those of Weber and Bourdieu, and can be distinguished from the more psychological approaches that consider lifestyle as an organisation of personality, a system of values, and a pattern of behaviour justified by these values. These conceptualisations have received some criticism, especially for their privileged reference to consumption.Still others have considered the dynamic nature of a lifestyle and its influence on health. For example, some researchers have defined a healthy lifestyle as a person’s capacity to make changes in their health behaviours as they change over time. This is an important concept because it suggests that a healthy lifestyle should not only be about avoiding unhealthy behaviours, but also about embracing healthy ones. This concept is more suited to a sociological framework than the one of a medical discipline, but it remains an important topic for further research. In the following, we will try to re-consider these different interpretations of a lifestyle along three perspectives: the internal, the external and the temporal.