The Effect of Sports Fan Identification on the Cognitive Processing of Sports News

Abstract

An experiment investigates the impact of fan identification on the cognitive and emotional processing of sports-related news media. Two coaches were featured; one conceptualized as negatively valenced the other positively. Participants completed a fan identification scale before stimuli presentation. While watching the press conferences, heart rate, skin conductance, and corrugator muscle activity were recorded as indices of cognitive resource allocation, emotional arousal, and aversive motivation activation respectively. Self-report measures were collected after each stimulus. Results show that highly identified fans process sports-related news content differently than moderate fans, allocating more cognitive resources and exhibiting greater aversive reactions to the negatively valenced coach. Comparisons between the self-report and psychophysiology data suggest that the latter may be less susceptible to social desirability response bias when emotional reaction to sports messages are concerned.

Soccer in the mass media: Examining the role of metaperceptions of goal orientation on spectators’ moral functioning

“…Aggression and violence in sports have been widely investigated, and experts distinguish between specific athletes' violence and violence associated with the sporting events, indicating that a closer relationship between sport and media entertainment results in a greater interaction between these two types of violence (UNESCO, 1987). Studying the impact of watching sports in the media on spectator's cognitive and emotional responses has become a very relevant topic (e.g., Carriedo, Cecchini, and González, 2018;Gau, James, and Kim, 2009;Potter and Keene, 2012;Wann, Melnick, Russell, and Pease, 2001). However, additional work is needed to examine the consequences of the exposure of soccer related programming in terms of introjection, or regarding the affective, cognitive and behavioural processes of spectators.…”

Individual Differences in Selective Attention to Information Graphics in Televised Sports

“…One intuitive explanation is that the difference in time spent processing information graphics results from greater interest in the information contained therein. Thus, motivational differences among viewers yielded greater processing of information with the graphic elements (e.g., Hillman et al, 2000; Potter & Keene, 2012). A second possibility is that viewers with greater interest and knowledge of sport possessed the knowledge needed to understand the information graphics and therefore spent greater time reviewing the information.…”

“…Moreover, Van der Stigchel et al (2009) posit that visual attention works in a sequential fashion where bottom-up processing precedes top-down or controlled processing. To apply this to information graphics within mediated sports, onset of a graphic element should automatically elicit attention; however, viewer identification with a team—a top-down characteristic—is what determines the motivational relevance of the information and results in controlled attention to the element (Cummins, Tirumala, & Lellis, 2011; Hillman et al, 2000; Potter & Keene, 2012).…”

Interwoven Statesmanship and Sports Fandom

“…Fan identification towards the USMNT was measured using Wann and Branscombe’s (1993) Sport Spectator Identification Scale (SSIS). The SSIS “asks respondents the extent to which, for example, they follow their team’s performance through the media, how often they wear the team’s clothing, and the extent to which they dislike their team’s greatest rival” (Potter & Keene, 2012, p. 349). The items assess the degree to which an individual sees oneself as a fan, the extent to which friends see them as a fan, how closely the individual follows the team, and how often the fan displays apparel.…”