READING GUIDE TO: Gantz, W., Zheng, W.,
Bryant, P., and Potter, R (2006) ‘Sports
Versus All Comers: Comparing TV Sports Fans With Fans of Other
Programming
Genres’, in Journal of Broadcasting &
Electronic Media 50(1): 95—118.
This
is a study of the viewing
experience of sports fans, to examine any differences with viewers of
other genres
on dimensions of purposive viewing, involvement and whether or not
programmes generated follow-up activities such as reading or
looking up material on
the web.Self administered
questionnaires were used.
Sports
programmes have large numbers of
people viewing them: ‘several billion across the course of the
Olympics’ (95),
but there can be similar audiences, for example for Friends.It
is possible to find fans across all
genres, and they are important because they offer a steady viewing base.Does fanship have common features?The usual definitions involve active and
interested
watching.It is possible to predict
distinctive cognitive and affective and behavioural outcomes, involving
knowledge and experience and emotional involvement.Fanship can be empowering, and it can also
help people escape from stress and fulfil themselves, but it also
involves
anxiety and pain, especially if there is overidentification with the
fate of
the team.It is possible to think of
fanship
as occupying a continuum of knowledge, interest and frequency of
watching.
Lots
of studies are cited, referring to
matters such as motivation, arousal, activity, previewing preparation
[there is
a hint of a particularly interesting variability to find ‘intrinsic
pleasures’
98, not further discussed].Location of
watching might also be important.Lots
of psychological scales have been developed to measure stress and
eustress,
self esteem, a sense of escape, group affiliation, response to family
needs,
and the relation to different types of sport.Fans seem to display a similar combination of these
states to
athletes.There are gender differences,
with men more fan-like.There are
differences between the genders in terms of whether sport is close to
core
identity, or whether it is seen as a family centred activity. Studies
of
college students are highly represented.
There
are some similarities noted
between sports fans and fans of other genres such as soap operas.Soap fans also display a ‘cognitive and
affective investment in storylines’ (99).Some soap fans use bulletin boards to actively
attempt to influence the
stories in soaps.Fans of reality shows [
pseudo sporty ones?]
also are attracted to seeing real people, and watch to be entertained
or avoid
boredom.They often claim insight into
people’s behaviour.In some cases there
are spinoff activities here as well, for example the show Survivor has led to
fantasy games online. It is possible therefore to predict similarities
and
differences between sports fans and other fans.It might be the case that soap operas are scripted
so there is less
anxiety for the viewer.However, reality
programmes are represented as live and unscripted too [and so fans
should be
closer to sports fans].
This
study took a sample of students,
arguing that students ‘are not likely to vary…from
others in the population’ (101), at least in terms of the overt
behaviour,
such as the frequency with which they watch television [however, their
cultural
capital is likely to be different, although this is a psychological
study so
factors like this are not investigated].Self administered questionnaires were carefully
devised in a cycle of
test and pretest.For example closed
questions were mostly used in the real thing, and these were similar to
other
psychological tests on activities and motivations.However, a pilot stage used open-ended
questions devised by a panel including telecommunications students, who
were
also asked for the views of family and friends.
There
were 383 volunteers, and the
questionnaires were administered under the supervision of one of the
researchers.The sample had nearly equal
numbers of men
and women, the subject ages ranged from 18 to 57, and students were
recruited
from across all the years of the degree programme.Questions focused on eight genres and asked
things like whether or not students had enjoyed them, on a 10-point
scale.Students were also asked to
estimate the
number of hours they spent on activities such as reading sports news or
items
on the web: high scores were used to differentiate sports fans.After this preliminary survey, the team were
able to focus on comparisons between sports programmes and one
favourite
alternative genre, and to compare the answers for each question.Fans were defined according to their scores
on the enjoyment scale (more than eight) and the time spent on follow
up
activities (at least 1 hour a day on sports news and web browsing).Similar definitions were used for fans of
other
genre.Then non fans were excluded from
further analysis (only 25 of them).Subsequent questions were asked on preparation,
motives, behaviour, and
feelings during and after watching, again with a 10-point scale for
each.
For
previewing
behaviour, subjects were
asked questions such as whether they read a lot about the show or
match;
whether they browse the web; plan and schedule; anticipate events; plan
location and relations with friends; engage in superstitious behaviour;
bet
with or without money.For motivations,
it was things like whether they watched because there was nothing else
on; to escape; and to enable later talk with friends; because they
didn’t
want to miss out; because they cared about the participants; because of
the
effect of a partner; because they wanted to relate to life; because
they felt
some responsibility; because they felt connected to the players or
characters; to make fun of players or characters; to be in the know; to
enjoy
unpredictability; and excitement; as an excuse to drink; or to learn
lessons
for life [and several others—did any of these overlap?] (103 – 4).Behaviours
were investigated such as
subsequent talk; drinking; experiencing of happiness or excitement.Post
viewing behaviour included whether people
read about the events; followed them up; or had developed certain moods
afterwards (104).107 sports fans were
identified, mostly males.94 identified
as fans of sitcoms, 49 fans of adult oriented animation, 45 fans and
drama, 30
of reality programmes, 21 of evening talk or comedy programmes.Most of the fans seemed pretty involved, with
average scores of 9.5.There was however
little interest in daytime talk shows or soaps.
A
MANOVA analysis was conducted for each
stage [prior, during and after as above] related to the genre of fans.There were significant effects of the genre
of fans on previewing, motivations, and behaviours and post viewing.Gender differences were significant among
these four as well (105).Sports fans in
particular were more likely to do all four than other fans.There were some similarities to fans of
reality programmes; drama fans were most likely to watch with friends;
fans of
sitcoms more likely to talk to friends; sports fans to do follow-up
activities.Similar results were found
when comparing motivations, and sports fans were especially interested
in who
wins, in enjoying unpredictability and escape.Emotional commitment was also high.Reality fans and sitcom fans also care about what
happens or who wins,
but sports fans score significantly higher.When examining behaviours, sports fans were
particularly likely to
report feeling happy when their team won, feeling excited, but also
feeling
anxious.Reality and drama fans were
also close this time, but again lower in terms of scores are generally.Sports fans were particularly different from
fans of adult animation.The same sort
of results were found in post viewing behaviour – sports fans were more
emotionally involved and likely to follow up.
So
sports fans do seem to be different
from other fans, especially in their pre and post viewing activities:
sports
fans seem particularly to enjoy stretching out their involvement.Sports fans have the strongest identification
with performers, and there watching is strongly related to their
personal
identities, producing a vested interest in positive outcomes.These results arise not just because there is
more sports coverage than any other kind, the team feel.The items might have been derived from a
sports context in the first place, which could bias measurement, but
the team made
sure there was a good mix of items.They
also excluded those indicators of extreme fandom, which left a
generally rather
low threshold for inclusion [which strengthens their view that their
sample is
not that different from the ordinary population?].Sports fanship is heavily male.However, the team were surprised by the
heavily female support for reality programmes.Since reality programmes and sports programmes are
similar genres, is
possible that females support reality programmes as a kind of
compensation.However, female seem less
interested in suspense.More research is
needed.