FiT Publishing

Guided by network theory, the purpose of this paper is to explore the consumption networks of Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA) fans. Through an egocentric network analysis, the authors utilize hierarchical linear modeling to examine the strength of consumption ties among WNBA fans during the 2019 season. Initial results revealed an unexpected finding: the presence of participants who reported having no fan-to-fan ties, whom we term IsoFans. A second sample of men’s basketball fans was then collected to serve as a comparative confirmation of the unexpected result, whereby...Read more

For decades, scholars have sought to understand individuals’ identification with sport teams. As a result, we have great knowledge of how team identification influences a variety of attitudinal and behavioral out-comes as well as the impact of identifying with a team on an individual’s sense of self. However, nearly all studies of team identification have dealt with men’s sport rather than women’s sport. The authors addressed this issue in the current study by using the Delphi technique to solicit expert opinion on the lack of team identification research in women’s sport, including...Read more