Exploring Fan Behavior: Developing a Scale to Measure Sport eFANgelism

2015 ◽  
Vol 29 (6) ◽  
pp. 642-656 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brendan Dwyer ◽  
Gregory P. Greenhalgh ◽  
Carrie W. LeCrom
Keyword(s):  
Step Method ◽  
Sport Fans ◽  
Sport Team ◽  
Fan Behavior ◽  
Spectator Sport ◽  
The Spectator ◽  
The Many ◽  
Data Collections ◽  
Team Brand ◽  
Brand Evangelism

Brand evangelism, an advanced form of marketing where consumers voluntarily advocate on behalf of the brand, can bring numerous benefits to a firm. Pro-brand behaviors such as word-of-mouth promotion, recruitment of consumers, and disparagement of rivals are just a few of the many actions associated with brand evangelism. With highly impassioned and provocative fans, an opportunity exists to explore brand evangelism within the spectator sport context. The purpose of this study was to develop and validate a scale to measure sport team (brand) evangelism. Guided by Fournier’s (1998) brand extension of relationship theory and following Churchill’s (1979) eight-step method for developing marketing measures, two focus groups of fans were interviewed and an additional 450 sport fans were surveyed through two distinct data collections in an attempt to identify sport team evangelistic behaviors, and test a measure of such behaviors. The assessment of the instrument included two forms of reliability analysis and three modes of validity analysis as the scale was parsimoniously reduced from 88 initial behaviors to four factors and 14 items.

Exploring and Measuring Spectator Sport Fanaticism

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 58-85 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brendan Dwyer ◽  
Carrie LeCrom ◽  
Gregory P. Greenhalgh
Keyword(s):  
Focus Groups ◽  
Leisure Activities ◽  
Media Consumption ◽  
Sport Fans ◽  
Sport Team ◽  
Expert Review ◽  
Fan Behavior ◽  
Spectator Sport ◽  
Three Samples ◽  
Sport Fan

Spectator sport fan behavior is vast and represents one of the society’s most universal leisure activities. While event attendance and media consumption has received a great deal of attention from researchers, there is growing understanding that sport fans interact with their favorite teams in numerous other ways. Little is known, however, of what constitutes the fanatical behavior of sport spectators. Thus, there is an opportunity to understand the impassioned actions of the sport fan population to provide marketers and media providers with a better understanding of how sport fans interact with team brands beyond direct consumption. The current study aimed to discover and develop an instrument to measure spectator sport team fanaticism. Two focus groups were utilized to uncover and generate items. Three samples and an expert review were then conducted to validate the instrument. The following four unique dimensions were uncovered and preliminarily validated: instigation, superstition, committed interaction, and vicarious impact.

For Love or Money: Developing and Validating a Motivational Scale for Fantasy Football Participation

2011 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 70-83 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brendan Dwyer ◽  
Yongjae Kim
Keyword(s):  
Future Research ◽  
Communication Tool ◽  
Fantasy Sports ◽  
Step Method ◽  
Internet Applications ◽  
Fantasy Football ◽  
Sport Fans ◽  
Spectator Sport ◽  
Sport Fan ◽  
Print Publications

The contemporary sport fan has the ability to consume spectator sport through several means including event attendance, television and radio broadcasts, print publications, and Internet applications. Recently, an ancillary sport service, termed fantasy sports, has become one of the most popular activities among sport fans. As a result, the business of fantasy sports is booming. This study examined motivational dimensions underlying fantasy football participation from a Uses and Gratifications perspective. Utilizing Churchill’s (1979) five-step method for developing quality marketing measures, this study identified and validated three motivational dimensions:entertainment/escape, competition, andsocial interaction. The results suggest a pattern of fantasy football participation that is more purposeful and active than traditional media use. Discussed are the gambling associations, future research opportunities, and suggestions for developing fantasy football participation into a more creative and interactive marketing communication tool.

scholarly journals Becoming Sport Fans: Relative Deprivation and Social Identity

2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 118 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yong Chae Rhee ◽  
John Wong ◽  
Yukyoum Kim
Keyword(s):  
Relative Deprivation ◽  
Social Identification ◽  
Team Identification ◽  
Support Teams ◽  
Sport Fans ◽  
Sport Team ◽  
Fan Behavior ◽  
Irrational Behavior ◽  
Community Identification ◽  
Sport Fan

This study explores how people become sport fans by elucidating why people support teams even when they are unsuccessful. This study fills a gap in the literature on sport fan behavior by applying Relative Deprivation and Social Identification Theories to understand sport fans’ seemingly irrational behavior. We conducted a series of interviews with 17 sport fans with diverse backgrounds. Findings suggest that interaction among Community Identification, Relative Deprivation, Team Identification, Sport Involvement and Representativeness of a sport team helps explain why people support certain teams and become fans, regardless of team success. Findings suggest that team Representativeness in a specific community is one of the most important factors influencing people to become fans. We also found that sport involvement is very important, especially if relative deprivation can elicit team identification from people with little to no sport involvement. Further research may identify the exact relationship between sport involvement and relative deprivation.

Elevating self-esteem through sport team identification: a study about local and distant sport fans

2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 695-718
Author(s):  
Yannis Lianopoulos ◽  
Nicholas D. Theodorakis ◽  
Nikolaos Tsigilis ◽  
Antonis Gardikiotis ◽  
Athanasios Koustelios
Keyword(s):  
Self Esteem ◽  
Limited Attention ◽  
Team Identification ◽  
Psychological Consequences ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Sport Fans ◽  
Sport Team ◽  
Fan Behavior ◽  
Collective Self ◽  
Collective Self Esteem

PurposeThe concept of sport team identification has been widely used as a theoretical framework in explaining sport fan behavior. However, limited attention has been devoted to the consequences of distant (i.e., foreign) team identification. The purpose of the current research was to examine the way in which fans (local and distant) can increase their levels of collective and personal self-esteem due to their team identification.Design/methodology/approachData were accumulated from three Greek websites (N = 742). Among them, 623 subjects were grouped as local and 119 as distant football fans. A structural invariance analysis was followed.FindingsThe results revealed how team identification, enduring team-related social connections, and basking in reflected glory are interrelated to affect collective and finally personal self-esteem. Moreover, no differences were found between local and distant fans regarding the paths from eam identification to collective self-esteem and from collective self-esteem to personal self-esteem.Originality/valueThis is one of the first endeavors to examine the psychological consequences of distant team identification and to test the invariance across local and distant fans concerning the mechanisms that their personal self-esteem can be enhanced because their psychological connection to their favorite sport team.

scholarly journals crestr An R package to perform probabilistic climate reconstructions using fossil proxies

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manuel Chevalier
Keyword(s):  
R Package ◽  
Climate Reconstruction ◽  
Diagnostic Tools ◽  
Calibration Data ◽  
Reconstruction Process ◽  
Climate Reconstructions ◽  
Reconstruction Software ◽  
Modelling Assumptions ◽  
The Many ◽  
Data Collections

Abstract. Statistical climate reconstruction techniques are practical tools to study past climate variability from fossil proxy data. In particular, the methods based on probability density functions (PDFs) are powerful at producing robust results from various environments and proxies. However, accessing and curating the necessary calibration data, as well as the complexity of interpreting probabilistic results, often limit their use in palaeoclimatological studies. To address these problems, I present a new R package (crestr) to apply the CREST method (Climate REconstruction SofTware) on diverse palaeoecological datasets. crestr includes a globally curated calibration dataset for six common climate proxies (i.e. plants, beetles, chironomids, rodents, foraminifera, and dinoflagellate cysts) that enables its use in most terrestrial and marine regions. The package can also be used with private data collections instead of, or in combination with, the provided dataset. It also includes a suite of graphical diagnostic tools to represent the data at each step of the reconstruction process and provide insights into the effect of the different modelling assumptions and external factors that underlie a reconstruction. With this R package, the CREST method can now be used in a scriptable environment, thus simplifying its use and integration in existing workflows. It is hoped that crestr will contribute to producing the much-needed quantified records from the many regions where climate reconstructions are currently lacking, despite the existence of suitable fossil records.

Predicting Fan Behavior Through Egocentric Network Analysis: Examining Season-Ticket Holder Renewal

2020 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 217-228
Author(s):  
Matthew Katz ◽  
Bob Heere ◽  
E. Nicole Melton
Keyword(s):  
Network Analysis ◽  
Network Theory ◽  
College Football ◽  
Research Approach ◽  
Season Ticket ◽  
Sport Fans ◽  
Fan Behavior ◽  
Past Behavior ◽  
Sport Fan ◽  
Egocentric Network

The purpose of this study is to utilize egocentric network analysis to predict repurchase behaviors for college football season-ticket holders. Using a research approach grounded in network theory, we included the relational and behavioral characteristics of sport fans in a binomial regression model to predict renewal decisions among college football season-ticket holders. More specifically, we developed a model that incorporates the egocentric network variables, past behavior, and behavioral intentions to empirically test which consumer characteristics predict future behavior. Building on previous research emphasizing the role of socializing agents and social connections in sport fan consumption, through the use of egocentric network analysis, we examined the effects of social structure and social context on repurchasing decisions. Moreover, the present study is positioned within the larger discourse on season-ticket holders, as we aimed to add a network theory perspective to the existing research on season-ticket holder churn and renewal.

Classifying Sport Consumers

2020 ◽  
pp. 323-356
Author(s):  
David P. Hedlund ◽  
Rui Biscaia ◽  
Maria do Carmo Leal
Keyword(s):  
Sense Of Community ◽  
Demographic Characteristics ◽  
Social Recognition ◽  
Shared Knowledge ◽  
Sporting Events ◽  
Sports Fans ◽  
Cluster Analyses ◽  
Sport Fans ◽  
Fan Behavior ◽  
Sport Fan

Sport fans rarely attend sporting events alone. While traditional consumer and sport fan behavior research often examines fans based on demographic characteristics, recent advances in understanding how sport fans co-create and co-consume sporting events provides substantial evidence that sports fans should be examined as tribal groups. Tribal sport fan groups can be identified based on seven dimensions, including membership; geographic sense of community; social recognition; shared rivalry; and shared knowledge of symbols, rituals and traditions, and people. In this research, these seven dimensions are used to classify sport fans (n=1505) through hierarchical and k-cluster analyses. The results of the cluster analyses using the seven dimensions suggest six unique clusters, labelled as (1) casual fans, (2) moderate remote fans, (3) moderate local fans, (4) local developing tribal fans, (5) remote tribal fans, and (6) tribal fans. A discussion of these six fan groups and the implications regarding associations with demographics and other important variables are provided.

scholarly journals Cause-Related Marketing and Purchase Intention toward Team-Licensed Products: Moderating Effects of Sport Consumers’ Altruism

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (8) ◽  
pp. 3183
Author(s):  
Woo-yeul Baek ◽  
Hyun-seok Song ◽  
Doo-Han Kim ◽  
Kevin K. Byon
Keyword(s):  
Purchase Intention ◽  
Sport Marketing ◽  
Professional Sport ◽  
Moderating Effects ◽  
Sport Fans ◽  
Sport Team ◽  
Cause Related Marketing ◽  
Study Results ◽  
Helping Others ◽  
Baseball Fans

Cause-related marketing (CRM) has been a crucial concept of sport marketing literature in the professional sport context. However, there is little evidence available to address the effectiveness of CRM when the levels of sport fans’ embedded psychological characteristics helping others are considered. The present study aimed to investigate the influence of sport fans’ perceived CRM motive of a sport team on fan attitude and purchase intention for the team-licensed products, and the moderating effects of sport fans’ altruism on the relationships among these variables in the context of the Korean professional baseball league. A total of 164 Korean baseball fans participated in the present study. Results revealed that sport fans’ perceived CRM motive significantly affected fan attitude and purchase intention for the team-licensed products, and fan attitude also had a significant impact on purchase intention. Moreover, sport fans’ altruism had significant moderating effects on the relationships between perceived CRM motive and purchase intention, as well as team attitude and purchase intention for the team-licensed products. Consequently, the present study might demonstrate that professional sport fans with high altruism are more likely than fans with low altruism to evaluate the motive of a team’s CRM campaign as cause-oriented and show their support for the campaign.

Optimizing the Online Channel in Professional Sport to Create Trusting and Loyal Consumers: The Role of the Professional Sports Team Brand and Service Quality

2012 ◽  
Vol 26 (6) ◽  
pp. 463-478 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jamie Carlson ◽  
Aron O'Cass
Keyword(s):  
Service Quality ◽  
Online Survey ◽  
Critical Issue ◽  
Professional Sport ◽  
Brand Strength ◽  
Marketing Environment ◽  
Sport Team ◽  
Sport Teams ◽  
Team Brand

How professional team-based sport organizations can optimize their e-service platform and manage their brand in an increasingly multichannel marketing environment is a critical issue. This study examines how sports consumers’ (i.e., fans’) perceptions of e-service quality, brand strength, and image congruency between the sport brands’ offline image and online image affects the development of consumers’ trust in the team’s website. In addition, the study explores the role of team website trust in developing team website loyalty, as well the role of loyalty in actual purchase frequency from the teams’ website. Data were collected via an online survey of sports consumers of e-services delivered by professional sport teams. The results indicate that sport team brand strength, followed by teams website e-service quality and brand image congruency between the teams online and offline activity are significant determinants of trust in the teams’ website, with online trust strongly influencing website loyalty intentions.

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