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The purpose of this study is to evaluate the perceived enjoyment that is derived from spectators observing other spectators’ dysfunctional behavior during a game.

Using four forms (i.e. fighting, verbal assault, disrupting play and throwing missiles) of spectators dysfunctional behavior (SDB), two experiments (N = 252 for Study 1 and N = 92 for Study 2) were conducted in which video clips corresponding to the four types of SDB were used as experimental stimuli.

The findings indicate that participants enjoyed viewing spectators running onto the field of play significantly more than the other forms of SDB (i.e. fighting, verbal assaults and throwing missiles). The results also show no significant difference between how much spectators enjoyed the actions of fighting, verbal assault and throwing missiles.

The novelty of this study include the usage of a multidimensional approach to the concept of SDB and testing for a positive outcome pertaining to SDB that has largely, if not fully, been examined using negative inputs and outputs.

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the psychometric properties of each item in the Sport Spectator Identification Scale (SSIS) (Wann and Branscombe, 1993) using the item response theory (IRT) and to provide evidence for modifications in the scale.

A total of 635 spectators of US professional sports responded to the seven-item SSIS on an eight-point semantic differential scale. The general partial credit model was fitted to the data.

The results revealed that four items (Items 1, 2, 3 and 5) provide a relatively high amount of information, whereas three items (Items 4, 6 and 7) provide a low amount of information, indicating different levels of measurement precision among the items. Furthermore, the results showed that some low-level response options were rarely selected by participants, indicating that it may not be necessary to include response options as many as eight within each item.

Unlike previous studies examining the psychometric properties of the SSIS as a whole, the present study provides information about the usefulness of each item of the SSIS in measuring individuals' team identification. Based on the findings, the authors identified some issues with the three problematic items, including the wording of the items and the link between the question and the target construct. The authors make several suggestions for researchers and practitioners in improving individual item quality and in making informed decisions when using the SSIS in the future.

The global outbreak of the COVID-19 forced most sport leagues to cancel games in March–April 2020, leaving no sport games to watch for sport fans. The present study examined how sport consumers appraise stress and engage in coping behaviors resulted from sport lockout due to the global pandemic.

This study examined the relationship between sport fans’ psychological dispositions, threat appraisal and coping strategies among professional sport fans in the USA. A panel of sport fans (N = 446) representative of the US adult population participated in an online survey in the fourth week of April, 2020 when no major sport leagues made a return from the lockout due to the COVID-19 outbreak.

Results of this present study showed that anger, aggressiveness and need for affiliation increased threat perceptions toward the COVID-19 lockout, which subsequently had significant effect on emotion-focused and disengagement coping behaviors.

This is the first empirical study that examined stress and coping behavior among sport fans in the global public health crisis context. Our findings show what triggers stress appraisals and how fans cope with them.

Findings suggest that segmenting sport fans based on psychological dispositions could be useful in predicting fans that will engage in coping behaviors.

While the hope is to return to normal postpandemic, COVID-19 might not be the last. We are uncertain whether there might be another potential pandemic-related sport lockdown. Understanding how lack of sport events can create distress in sport fans and have important public health implications.

The findings provide empirical evidence on how sport consumers respond to the pandemic-related sport lockdown and cope with the unprecedented situation. The findings of this study contribute to the sport management literature as we are unsure whether the sport industry might face this challenging situation in the future again.

The results from this study extend previous research by empirically testing the involvement based Psychological Continuum Model (PCM) segmentation procedure on sports spectators. To date, the procedure has only been verified using sports participants, although the PCM was developed with a broader range of sports consumers in mind. The validity of the procedure is confirmed using two online surveys, which gather data from spectators at both the league (n=761) and team (n=623) level. A three-step segmentation procedure then places respondents into the PCM stages - awareness, attraction, attachment and allegiance. ANOVA tests indicate that the four groups significantly differ from one another on attitudinal and behavioural measures for both league and team spectators. Findings suggest that the PCM is an appropriate framework to investigate fan development at both league and team levels. Thus sports marketers are provided with a research segmentation tool capable of helping them to better understand their heterogeneous consumer bases and thus guide marketing decisions.

This paper advances our understanding of the relationship between quality, value and satisfaction in the context of spectator sport services. This is achieved through an analysis and examination of relevant secondary data culminating in a conceptual model. Although extensive research has been conducted in the three separate areas of quality, value and satisfaction, to date no work has been reported attempting to develop macro models that capture the concepts and their potential interrelationships. Such macro models could enhance the communication and stimulate further research for sport marketing scholars. This paper proposes a model apposite for further research and in the process leads to the potential confirmation, rejection or indeed, adaptation of the conceptualization of sport services.

This study seeks to examine the moderating role of team identification regarding the relationship between service quality and repurchase intentions among spectators of professional sports.

Quantitative data are collected from a questionnaire survey of 257 spectators attending a professional soccer game in Greece. Multiple regression analyses are used to assess the relationships among the constructs of service quality, repurchase intentions, and team identification.

Team identification is shown to moderate the relationship between service quality and repurchase intentions among spectators at this professional sports event. Both overall service quality and two specific service‐quality dimensions (“responsiveness” and “reliability”) are found to be positively associated with repurchase intentions only among respondents with low and medium team identification. No relationship is found between service quality and repurchase intentions among those with high team identification.

Managers of professional sports events who wish to increase attendances by improvements in service quality should first segment their customers according to degree of team affiliation. They should then design their service offerings specifically to meet the service‐quality expectations of sports fans with medium or low team identification.

The study provides valuable empirical evidence of the moderating role of team identification with regard to the relationship between service quality and repurchase intentions among consumers of professional sports events.

The purposes of this paper is to segment spectators of collegiate football game using a cluster analysis and to determine differences between spectator clusters based on motivations, satisfaction, and demographic characteristics.

A survey instrument was utilized, and a total of 407 usable data were gathered through a convenience sampling method at a main campus in the Southern USA. A discriminant analysis was employed to create cluster profiles including demographic variables not previously included in the clustering procedure. Cluster analysis is a procedure used to determine best group segmentation.

Through a factor-cluster analysis, two distinct groups are identified as attendees of collegiate football games: far-away fans and seasoned sideliners. Knowing the different spectators in event attendance allows marketers of collegiate sport events to effectively target segments and attract larger numbers of visitors to each event. Although the results indicated lower satisfaction with the far-away fans cluster, they are nonetheless spending their money at these events. A concerted effort to better welcome tourists that are supporting the visiting team may help boost their image of the local community and thus increase their spending level.

The current study adds to the literature on sport event research, while providing great insight for researchers and practitioners how to segment their target market. Therefore, it is believed that the results of the present study will help future researchers and industry practitioners make use of the implications and findings to broaden their knowledge about sport marketing.

Customer complaints and service recovery via virtual customer service channels (VCSCs) present unique recovery situations unlike those commonly found in traditional complaint handling channels. Some of these distinct challenges include the presence of multiple customers during a recovery, which creates the possibility for uncivil customer-to-customer (C2C) exchanges to harm a complainant’s experience. To this end, this paper aims to explore customer- and firm-level aspects as they relate to social media complaint handling. A customer-level moderator (attitude toward complaining) and a firm-level moderator (relative promptness of the response) are examined.

Data from three studies use partial least squares structural equation modeling to analyze hypothetical failure and complaining scenarios on VCSCs. Study 1A (a firm’s social media channel) and Study 1B (a firm’s online support community) investigate how a complainant’s predisposition toward complaining ultimately influences their experiential value (hedonic, pragmatic and sociability) during a virtual service recovery that includes uncivil communication from another customer. Study 2 further examines how the relative promptness of a service provider’s response either before or after uncivil C2C interactions hinders a complainant’s experiential value during the service recovery encounter.

The results show support for the influence of attitude toward complaining and the relative promptness of response as impactful to a complainant’s hedonic, pragmatic and social experience in virtual service encounters that involve one customer rudely interjecting into a complainant’s online service recovery encounter.

This research is one of the first to apply both customer- and firm-level moderating aspects associated with virtual service recovery encounters. The studies quantitatively assess the moderators’ influence on online dysfunctional behavior’s relationship with C2C fairness perceptions, and the subsequent experiential value a complainant receives on VCSCs. In particular, the investigation of relative promptness of a service provider’s response is a unique conceptualization that expands prior recovery studies’ focus on promptness or quickness of a recovery. The authors put forth a more prompt response that benefits the firm by purposively and symbolically closing out the encounter on VCSC, which somewhat reduces the negative effects of rude follow-up comments. This study is also novel because of the experiential focus on C2C interactions during recovery, rather than focusing on how a firm resolves a failure. In addition, this is the first service recovery study to assess multiple types of online customer service channels. Implications are put forth for service recovery theory and managers who attend to customer complaints on virtual channels.

Storytelling has long been a popular strategy in marketing. Despite its ubiquity, the influence of storytelling in the sport marketing literature has not been investigated, especially on consumers' perspective. Thus, the purpose of this study is to (a) examine the effect of storytelling on sport consumers, and (b) explore the moderation effect of product involvement on the relationship between storytelling and purchase intention of a signature sneaker.

Two experiments using 3 (storytelling: bullet-point type vs. athlete-based story vs. product-based story) × 2 (product involvement: low vs. high) between-subjects experimental design were conducted.

The main finding illustrates that both the athlete-based story and the product-based story had a stronger influence on a consumer's purchase intention than the information that was given in a bullet-point condition. This study provides a theoretical implication of storytelling strategy for sport marketing literature. From a managerial perspective, the authors heavily recommend the use of storytelling in sport product advertisements.

Previous literature has highlighted the effect of storytelling in sports organization such as professional sports team or utilization in social media. However, limited studies could be found in the sports product industry and consumer behavior sector. Thus, the current study has a significant value of understanding the storytelling strategy in the perspective of sports consumers as well as brand marketers.

President Bill Clinton has had many opponents and enemies, most of whom come from the political right wing. Clinton supporters contend that these opponents, throughout the Clinton presidency, systematically have sought to undermine this president with the goal of bringing down his presidency and running him out of office; and that they have sought non‐electoral means to remove him from office, including Travelgate, the death of Deputy White House Counsel Vincent Foster, the Filegate controversy, and the Monica Lewinsky matter. This bibliography identifies these and other means by presenting citations about these individuals and organizations that have opposed Clinton. The bibliography is divided into five sections: General; “The conspiracy stream of conspiracy commerce”, a White House‐produced “report” presenting its view of a right‐wing conspiracy against the Clinton presidency; Funding; Conservative organizations; and Publishing/media. Many of the annotations note the links among these key players.