: Empirical sciences study decision-making predominantly from a third-person perspective and mostly in a laboratory setting. However, the mentioned approaches do not provide comprehensive insight into the decision-making process. What is missing is the first-person perspective of the decision-maker as well as the knowledge of how one experiences decision-making in everyday life. Similarly, within sport psychology and exercise psychology, there is a lack of qualitative research addressing the experience of processes related to physical activity. The aims of this master’s thesis are: to study how recreational joggers experience the decision-making process to go jogging, namely during episodes (i.e., in distinct moments of experience); and to examine how this experience is embedded in their everyday lives. In accordance with the aims, I carried out a study in an effort to contribute to our understanding of decision-making from the first-person perspective as it occurs in daily life. The data collection process was conducted using a micro-phenomenology-based method as well as the ethnographic method. Seven co-researchers – recreational joggers interested in exploring their own experience – participated in the study. They recorded episodes in which they were thinking about going jogging in the form of journal entries. These further served as the basis for six phenomenological interviews, with which I obtained descriptions of experience in the investigated episodes. Semi-structured interviews were conducted to study the context in which the episodes occurred. The data analysis was conducted following the qualitative data analysis approach and was carried out on three levels, namely by gradually combining experiential and ethnographic data. The results showed that the decision-making to go jogging in the episodes occurred on the basis of affective states, on the basis of rational judgment regarding the feasibility of going jogging, or the decision occurred spontaneously. The experience of the decision-making process to go jogging was embedded in the co-researchers' everyday lives based on their disposition towards jogging, of which there were three: jogging as a non-committal form of relaxation, jogging as a way of balancing productivity with current pleasures, and jogging as a way of life. With this master's thesis, I add to the body of knowledge about the experience of decision-making. Additionally, I emphasize the need to research experiential phenomena on multiple levels and by combining several methods to obtain a more holistic description of the studied phenomenon.
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