“We have compared domestic travel versus weekends at home and found very few differences in terms of activities and experiences,” one of the researchers, clinical psychologist Jessica de Bloom, said via email. “The home environment poses some challenges in terms of mental detachment from work, particularly when your home turned into your office during the pandemic. And we know from [other] research that detachment is one of the most important components for recovery from work stress.”
Other doctors concur. “The value of vacation is to remove the stressors of one’s day-to-day engagements,” Boston University epidemiologist and mental health expert Sandro Galea said via email. “If that can be achieved through staying at home, it would have the same mental health benefit as going elsewhere.