Overview
- The peer‑reviewed paper, published Tuesday in the Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, finds that people experience surprise free time as longer than an equal planned break.
- The team labels these surprise gaps “windfall time” and says they feel bigger because people compare them to having no free time at all.
- Across seven surveys with more than 2,300 participants from campuses and the online platform Prolific, those who gained time tended to pick longer activities for work or leisure.
- Examples in the studies include choosing a 45‑minute task over a shorter one or walking to a coffee shop instead of grabbing a quick cup in the breakroom.
- The authors, led by Rutgers Business School’s Gabriela Tonietto, caution that last‑minute cancellations can push people toward unproductive drift, so managers should favor flexible planning over surprise scrubs.