템플스테이 체험과 체험 후 효과에 관한 질적 연구

Templestay Experiences and Effects: A Qualitative Study

Templestay, as a traditional Korean cultural tourism resource, might provide beneficial experiences and socio-psychological effects to its' participants. Using a qualitative research method, this study explored the templestay participants' experiences and the socio-psychological effects of the experiences. Data were collected from a focus group interview with 27 participants of four different templestay programs from January to March 2009. Results showed that nature, buddhist monks, buddhism ritual and life, and cultural events sparked the participant's templestay experiences. Results also indicated that the experience dimensions of the templestay participants included interaction with nature, self-development, education, and relaxation. Furthermore, results of this study revealed three different aspects of short term templestay effects(i.e., affective competency, cognitive competency, social competency). Findings from this study also suggested that from a short term perspective, templestay might contributed the participants' personal growth(improvement of the personal competency). But it also might contribute to the participants' quality of life improvement from a long term perspective.