Articles in this issue:

• Guest Editor's Introduction: Experimental Research in Sport Consumer Behavior

  Yong Jae Ko and Joon Sung Lee

  Sport consumer behavior has become a popular research domain in the field of sport marketing. Over the last decade, scholars have made tremendous efforts to develop a clearer understanding of the nature of sport-related experiences, needs and wants, and the benefits sport consumers derive from such experiences (Funk, Lock, Karg, & Pritchard, 2016). Although these efforts have contributed to describing key characteristics of sport consumers, (re)defining research constructs, and exploring the relationships between key constructs in sport consumer behavior research, scholars have...Read more

• The Effectiveness of Advertising Embedded in Televised Sport Programming: How Team Performance Influences de Formation

  Minkyo Lee

  Robert F. Potter

  Choong Hoon Lim

  and Paul M. Pederson

  The present study investigated the effect of emotions derived from the unique nature of spectator sport (e.g., uncertainty about outcomes) on sport fans’ responses to advertisements presented in a sport broadcasting context. In order to test the study’s hypotheses, a repeated measures design (i.e., program-induced valence [2] × program-induced arousal [2] × ad valence [2]) was employed. As hypothesized, the affective reactions to game outcomes (i.e., a win or a loss) had significant carry-over effects on the evaluative judgments to commercials. The findings enrich our understanding of how...Read more

• From BIRFing to BIRGing: A 10-Year Study of the Psychology of Cubs Fans

  Jonathan A. Jensen

  T. Christopher Greenwell

  Cori Coleman

  Matt Stitsinger

  and Damon Andrew

  In the years since basking in spite of reflected failure (BIRFing) was hypothesized, no empirical evidence has confirmed its existence, nor have the various hypothesized antecedents been investigated. This multiphase study makes a much-needed contribution to the sport consumer behavior literature in its investigation of BIRFing behaviors, utilizing a sample of long-suffering fans of the Chicago Cubs. Results confirmed that diehard fans do BIRF, the behavior is predicted by team identification, and that loyalty and camaraderie are antecedents. Data collection for the study’s second phase...Read more

• The Impact of Brand-Event Fit in Virtual Advertising on Sport Television Viewers’ Brand Attitudes

  Sangchul Park and Yuhei Inou

  When virtual advertising is inserted into a sport broadcast, viewers are simultaneously exposed to both a sport event and an advertised brand. The purpose of this study was to determine whether the perceived fit between a sport event and an advertised brand in virtual advertising affects viewers’ attitudes toward the advertised brand. Sport viewer confusion and event suspense were also examined, as a mediator and moderator, respectively, for the relationship between perceived fit and brand attitude. Participants (N = 131) took part in an experiment in which perceived fit and event suspense...Read more

• The Impact of Gender Expression on Female Athlete Endorser Effectiveness

  Heidi M. Parker

  Michael T. Mudrick

  and Janet S. Fink

  Grounded in associative learning theory and the match-up hypothesis, this study sought to determine how female athlete endorsers’ gender expression impacted perceptions of their effectiveness and endorser-product fit. A 2 (feminine/masculine characteristics) x 2 (feminine/masculine product) experimental design was conducted with 205 participants from two universities in the Northeast region of the United States. Hypotheses were tested using MANCOVA and ANCOVA and results indicated gender expression significantly impacted measures of endorser attractiveness, explaining 23% of the variance....Read more

• Types of Brand Transgressions and Consumers' Moral Reasoning Strategies on an Endorser

  Youngjin Hur

  Choong Hoon Lim

  Dong-Chun Won

  and Sun-Yong Kwon

  This study aims to examine the effects of types of brand transgressions and moral reasoning strategies (moral decoupling and moral rationalization) on consumers’ trustworthiness in and attitudes toward an athlete endorser when a brand company that sponsors the athlete commits transgressions. By using a professional research company, 440 individuals were recruited online. The one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) results reveal that consumers’ trustworthiness of and attitudes toward the endorser are likely to be lower for product transgressions than for moral transgressions. Higher levels of...Read more