Measuring Attitudinal Loyalty: Separating the Terms of Affective Commitment and Attitudinal Loyalty

Abstract

Current marketing research on attitudinal constructs such as commitment and loyalty is characterized by conceptual confusion and overlap. This study aims to improve the clarity of these terms by separating the commitment and loyalty constructs. It also provides a new scale for measurement of team loyalty. Commitment is a construct that is cross-sectional in nature and is internal to the individual. Alternatively, loyalty is longitudinal in nature and should be regarded as the result of interaction between negative external changes in the environment and the individual’s internal level of commitment. The proposed scale has its origins with the Psychological Commitment to Team scale. Our revisions to the scale provide the needed longitudinal dimension. The new Attitudinal Loyalty to Team Scale (ALTS), which has resistance to change as a central feature, demonstrates both reliability and validity.

The Relationship Among Fans’ Involvement, Psychological Commitment, and Loyalty in Professional Team Sports

“…For the measurement of sport spectators' psychological commitment, the vast majority of researchers have used unidimensional scales (Funk & James, 2001, 2006Heere & Dickson, 2008;Kwon & Trail, 2003;Mahony et al, 2000;Trail, Anderson and Fink, 2000). Heere and Dickson (2008) note that in current marketing research there is a conceptual confusion and overlap between the attitudinal constructs of commitment and loyalty.…”

“…Heere and Dickson (2008) note that in current marketing research there is a conceptual confusion and overlap between the attitudinal constructs of commitment and loyalty. Many researchers have suggested that commitment to a sport team reflects an attitude (Funk & James, 2001;Iwasaki & Havitz, 1998;Pritchard et al, 1999).…”

“…Other researchers use the two dimensions interchangeably (Funk & Pastore, 2000;Gladden & Funk, 2001). Heere and Dickson (2008) suggested that psychological commitment and attitudinal loyalty are two different constructs. According to Heere and Dickson (2008), commitment is an internal psychological state of mind an individual has toward a brand.…”

“…Moreover, Heere and Dickson (2008) proposed a new definition for attitudinal loyalty that provides a clearer distinction between commitment and attitudinal loyalty. They argued that "attitudinal loyalty is the result of the interaction between negative external changes and the highly developed attitude of an individual, which is characterized by persistence, resistance to change, biasing in cognitive processing and a guide to behavior based on the interaction between negative external changes and the individual's attitude" (p.233).…”

“…Heere and Dickson (2008) defined commitment as "an internal psychological state of mind an individual has toward an object" (p.230), and attitudinal loyalty as "the result of the interaction between negative external changes and the internal psychological connection" (p.230). In the present study, commitment and attitudinal loyalty were measured as distinct constructs, according to Heere and Dickson's suggestion that commitment is a cross-sectional construct that can be measured only at a single point in time, while attitudinal loyalty is longitudinal in nature (2008).…”