Social media posters and lurkers: The impact on team identification and game attendance in minor league baseball

Abstract

Social media has exploded over the past few years, with sport fans now acti vely contributi ng to social networks, blogs, news feeds and content-sharing sites. Because social media tools encourage user engagement, they should also increase consumer affi liati on with their teams. However, not much is known about the atti tudinal and behavioural diff erences between posters, sport fans who post content, and lurkers, those who post infrequently or not at all. This study, using mediati on and moderati on models of team identi fi cati on and game att endance, confi rms that both lurkers and posters identi fy with their teams and are likely to att end games. This study fi nds, however, that lurkers att end games more frequently than posters. These diff erences are discussed and recommendati ons are made to improve the use of social media by sport organizati ons. Suggesti ons for future research are also provided.

Benfica vs Sporting: o derby visto a partir do Twitter

“…Recorde-se, antes de mais, que adicionar uma hashtag a um tweet equivale a aglutinar-se a uma comunidade, num sentido lato, de utilizadores que usam o mesmo marcador, por isso, discutem o mesmo tópico (Yang et al, 2012). Estas evidências ecoam na teoria da identidade social, que, segundo Williams et al (2012), suporta a noção de que a pertença a um grupo proporciona benefícios psicológicos, incluindo normas comuns, pontos de vista partilhados e a perceção da diferença em relação aos elementos fora da comunidade.…”

“…Alguns (nós) são mais ativos, criam conteúdo, o que consiste numa ação, e cada vez que este conteúdo é twittado provoca-se um efeito. Por isso, são chamados de posters enquanto os lurkers são aqueles que simplesmente observam ou esporadicamente publicam (Williams et al, 2012).…”

The value of Twitter for sports fans

“…Finally, fans that consume online content develop significantly stronger affiliations with the team and, in turn, are more likely to attend sporting events. 47 …”

“…47 SEM, using the lavaan package in R, was employed to confirm the proposed model. The Comparative Fit Index (CFI), Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) and Standardized Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR) are reported.…”

“…For SEM analysis, the sample size of 133 would be considered a medium-sized sample. 47 In SEM, the null hypothesis is that the postulated model holds in the population. In contrast to traditional statistical procedures, however, the researcher hopes not to reject the null hypothesis.…”