Using leisure crafting to reduce emotional exhaustion at home during the COVID‐19 pandemic through better sleep and not thinking about the pandemic

Drawing on conservation of resources (COR) theory, we aimed to investigate whether leisure crafting reduces emotional exhaustion by improving sleep quality and strengthening psychological detachment from the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) pandemic. We posited that sleep quality and psychological detachment from the COVID‐19 pandemic mediate the negative relationship between leisure crafting and emotional exhaustion. We carried out a two‐wave longitudinal study among a group of individuals (N = 216) from Wuhan, China. We measured leisure crafting, sleep quality, and psychological detachment from the COVID‐19 pandemic at Time 1 and emotional exhaustion two months later at Time 2. We discovered that leisure crafting reduced emotional exhaustion at home by improving sleep quality and increasing psychological detachment from the COVID‐19 pandemic. At the end of this article, we discuss theoretical and practical implications, research limitations, and directions for future research.