Mind and body recovery: how rural tourism promotes occupational health in the public health context

Introduction Rising workplace stress has intensified scholarly attention to the relationship between leisure experiences and work-related outcomes. Rural tourism, characterized by restorative environmental qualities, may be closely associated with individuals' psychological and physiological recovery as well as their occupational attitudes. Methods Grounded in the Stimulus–Organism–Response (S-O-R) framework, this study developed and tested a structural model linking perceived restorative environmental characteristics of rural tourism to psychological and physiological recovery and subsequently to job crafting intention. Data were collected from 405 employed individuals through a questionnaire survey conducted between September and December 2025. A two-stage analytical approach integrating structural equation modeling (SEM) and artificial neural networks (ANN) was employed. Results SEM results indicated that distance from stressors, visual authenticity, experience continuity, and personal