The effect of daily stress in activity patterns: Evidence from a naturalistic experiment

Abstract

Stress is a ubiquitous factor in modern life, yet its behavioural consequences in real-world mobility remain poorly understood. Understanding how affective states influence daily activity organisation is central to advancing behavioural modelling in transportation. While laboratory evidence suggests that stress promotes habitual decision-making and reduces behavioural flexibility, empirical validation in real-world mobility contexts remains limited. This short paper summarises a first effort to develop an interpretable probabilistic modelling framework linking latent physiological stress to daily activity behaviour using multimodal wearable, GPS, mobility diary, and ecological momentary assessment data from 119 participants in a multi-day naturalistic experiment. Daily stress exposures are then tested, together with past behaviour, in explaining activity patterns the following day. Daily activity organisation is analysed along two complementary behavioural margins: (i) activity intensity, measured through the count of distinct activity types undertaken during a day, and (ii) participation in socially oriented activity types. Activity intensity is modelled using Poisson count regression with temporally ordered stress predictors, while participation behaviour is analysed using logistic regression. Results indicate systematic associations between prior stress exposure and subsequent behavioural organisation. Higher lagged stress is linked to measurable proportional changes in activity intensity and altered probabilities of social participation. Robustness analyses confirm that these findings are qualitatively stable across alternative stress constructions and heterogeneous across population subgroups. The study empirically demonstrates the importance of affective dynamics in daily-activity decision making from a naturalistic perspective.