DUMF5078 Dissertation

The Influence of Empty Stadiums on The Motivation And Performance Of The Players: A Case Study Of How Crowds Impact Motivational Levels Of Football Players In Stadiums.

Spectators in the stadiums across the world play a fundamental role. Specifically, some studies reveal that spectators have a positive impact on the drive and performance of the players in a game while other case studies suggest that they could have a negative influence on the performance of football players in stadiums. Therefore, this paper seeks to provide an overview and analysis of seven studies that provide evidence of the positive and negative impacts of crowds on performance and motivation levels of football players in stadiums.

Article 1: See you at the match: Motivation for sport consumption and intrinsic psychological reward of premier football league spectators in South Africa.

According to Stander and Zyl (2016), being aware of the experiences and motives of spectators in the stadiums could offer great opportunities for the on to capitalize on soccer matches as a major revenue stream for the South African economy. The study investigates how motives for consumption of sports predict intrinsic psychological rewards of African premier league football spectators. Using a sample of 806 spectators from several stadiums, the study confirms that there are intrinsic psychological rewards associated with sports consumption. Although their study does not provide a direct link to the effect of spectators in a football game on the motivation of players, it provides great insights on the intrinsic psychological rewards that these football games have on the spectators and die hard football fanatics. It imperative to highlight the fact that in most societies, football ignites great passion among a significant number of sports consumers. Millions of people across the glove consume football. In South Africa, for instance, football is the nation’s premier sport, not only for participation but also for spectator perspectives. More so, the sport provides meaningful experiences and social opportunities for football fanatics to interact while at the same time doing away with the divides among people. The drive for sport consumption theory posits that football audiences have varying psychological reasons for closely followng and consuming the sport. It is the intrinsic rewards associated with sports that acts as a driver for the purchasing behavior of spectators and also motivates consumers to more readily invest in consuming the same commodity over a long period of time.  This is largely in line with the tenets of the attachment theory as discussed by Ainsworth and Bowlby. According to the theory, people often develop strong emotional attachments to only a few products or services that they consume frequently. It is the extent of this attachment that influences the consistency with which the spectators seeks to interact with the product.

Article 2: Examining the relationship between sport spectator motivation, involvement, and loyalty: a structural model in the context of Australian Rules football

In this case study, Kim, Morgan, and Assaker (2020) evaluate the relationship between motivation of sports spectators, their involvements and loyalty in Australia. The study used a sample survey and collected data from 585 attendees of football matches in South Australia. According to this study, there is a strong positive association between the motivation of sports spectators and their socio-psychological involvement as well as behavioral involvement. Specifically, it was found that viewers’ motivation exhibits a mediating effect on their allegiance through both behavioral and socio-psychological involvement. The study also notes that there is a non-significant relationship between loyalty and motivation. Today, it can be argued that one of the strongest motivations that football fanatics have for attending matches is the vicarious achievement. On the other hand, behavioral involvement has the strongest effect on the loyalty of the spectators. Thus, from the study, it can be noted that there is a positive correlation between the motivation of sports spectators and their socio-psychological involvement as well as behavioral involvement Kim, Morgan, and Assaker (2020). However, in relation to the effects of the presence of spectators in the stadium to the motivation level of players in the field during the soccer games, the study provides very limited information on the subject matter.

Article 3: Audience Participation Games: Blurring the Line Between Player and Spectator

According to Seeker et al. (2017), Audience Participation Games (APGs) streamline the affiliation between game players, the game and spectators of the game to permit the audience to have a significant and meaningful impact on the game. APG refers to sports that have an equally cognizant group of spectators that participate in a manner that has a significant influence on the match. It is imperative to note that the popularity of APGs have grown exponentially over the past few years as a result of the rise in livestreaming websites and applications such as YouTube Gaming, Twitch and Hitbox. In this form of games, the users stream themselves playing games and can interact with a live audience. By and large, audience participants have an influence on the outcome of the game due to their active participation. However, they also have a restricted agency to take action in the game. As such, they can only observe gameplay. It is important to note that the innovations of new technology give the audience a chance to build themselves as an audience through mutual awareness instead of as a distributed spectator that only have the chance to watch the game without any form of participation. In the traditional football games, there are numerous drives for engagement by spectators. 

Negative Impacts

Artcile 4: The Dark Side of Spectator Behavior: Effects of Spectator Dysfunctional

Behavior on Anger, Rumination, and Revisit Intention

Despite the above cases suggesting that crowds of spectators have a positive effect on the performance and motivation of the players in a game, there are several case studies that suggest that they could have a negative influence on the motivation and performance of football players in stadiums. To begin with, the study of Kim and Byon (2020), examines the adverse impacts of spectator dysfunctional behavior on other viewers’ anger, revisit intention and rumination. From their study, it is discovered that SDB ignited other spectator’s anger and reduced their intentions to revisit the game in future. It is also vital to note that this research sheds some light on the negative impacts of spectatorship during sports which may in turn result in a reduction in the degree of motivation and participation of the football players. Primarily, this is because football audiences can participate in dysfunctional behaviors either in a non-aggressive manner or in an aggressive manner. Regardless, any form of consumer dysfunctional behavior often leads to psychological, physical, and financial damages of the organizations, and players. Imperatively, SDB does not only inflict damages on the victims but may also have significant adverse impacts on the consumption experience of other viewers who may cease from revisiting the games in the future. In turn, this will also lead to a negative impact on the morale and motivation of players during matches.

Article 5: The Influence of Emotions on Game and Service Satisfaction and Behavioral Intention in Winning and Losing Situations: Moderating Effect of Identification with the Team

In another study, Yim and Byon examine the impact of emotions on game service behavioral and intention satisfaction in losing and winning situations. According to the study, sports consumers’ behavioral intentions significantly differ depending on the outcome of the match. Such that consumers emotions relating to satisfaction of the game and satisfaction of the services after a win mediated the relationship between behavioral intention and emotions. However, after a loss, the resultant consumer emotions do not have a significant influence on the consumers satisfaction on the service. By and large, consumer stress, service failure, negative emotions and coping are often relating to customer dissatisfaction, negative publicity, customer defection, and unwillingness to return to stadiums to watch football matches. Also, in the sports world, losing and winning is a common part of the match. Consequently, it can be argued that consumer stress and service failure is an inevitable part of the process. Hence, it is important for stakeholders to recognize the connection between satisfaction, emotion, and behavioral intention and how consumers cope with failures of core services as this triggers unwillingness, to return, dissatisfaction and defection of consumers. Most importantly, the effects of dissatisfaction is not only experienced immediately after the game but may also be referred to in the future to make decisions. Specifically, the emotions generates by the outcomes and experience of the same may be carried over, implying that the sports spectators may be more generous toward service satisfaction when their team won in order to maintain positive emotional states.

Article 6: What do you hear? The effect of stadium noise on football players’ passing performances

In their study, Otte, Millar and Klatt (2020) evaluate the effects of stadium noise on the passing performance of football players during matches. It is fundamental to note that stadium noise plays an important role in professional sports across the globe. Stadium noise mainly comprises of auditory cues and can be both positive or negative. The results of the study reveals that there is a correlation between the passing times and the degree of noise in the stadium. As such, participants of the study exhibited quicker passing times in the baseline as compared to a scenario with no auditory cues and negative conditions. Noteworthy, passing times and passing accuracy are often considered as a major performance gauge for elite-level football-specific performance and skill production. From the point of view of sports science, external auditory cues have a major impact on both psychological and motor performance. Thus, any distractions from the fans in the stadium will significantly influence the performance of players during football matches. According to the study, novices exhibited decreases in their performance when working under conditions that possess distractions. However, experts displaced contrasting results, and instead they displayed enhanced performance under dual task conditions. Therefore, it can be argued that expert players with greater playing skill levels are less affected by cognitive destructions than newbies and sub-elite level athletes. Relevant sounds from the player’s own movements or their environments act as a vital information that helps in backing the correct perception of the incoming ball and the self-regulation of successive passing execution. In the same way, it is easy for the players to miss this multimodal type of perceptual information due to distracting auditory cues from the spectators which may they hinder perceptual search of strategies and self-regulated performance for non-expert players. For this reason, it can be argued that this study is an important source of information that can be used by key football stakeholders to help influence the performance of players through the understanding of the negative influences of the noise from spectators and tailoring training sessions to take the factor into consideration and familiarize players with stadium conditions.

Article 7: Causal effects of an absent crowd on performances and refereeing decisions during Covid-19

Lastly, a recent study by Bryson et al. (2020) is an important addition to the subject matter. Their research examine the causal effects of an absent crowd on the performances of players and referring decisions during football matches held during the Covid-19 pandemic. The research examines the professional football matches that played without spectators in closed stadiums. The findings of the research reveal that during this period, referees awarded fewer cards to the away teams, thereby causing a massive reduction in the home advantage that teams usually have during open matches with spectators. Notably, these outcomes have significant implications for the influence of social pressure on the neutrality of referees. Specifically, this implies that the nonattendance of the principally home-supporting mass of spectators reduced the social pressure on referees to penalize the away team more severely thereby allowing them to make decisions that are fairer. Hence, it is worth pointing out that the lack of a home crown is a major source of the differing punishment patterns compared to when the stadium is full of spectators cheering the home team. Regardless, the study did not establish any significant differences or changes in the performance of players given that the final score lines of games were not significantly different from the games without spectators.

Reference List

Bryson, A., Dolton, P., Reade, J.J., Schreyer, D., and Singleton, C. 2021. Causal effects of an absent crowd on performances and refereeing decisions during Covid-19. Economic Letters, 198(1), 1-3.

Kim, K.A. and Byon, K.K. 2020. The Dark Side of Spectator Behavior: Effects of Spectator Dysfunctional Behavior on Anger, Rumination, and Revisit Intention. Sport Marketing Quarterly, 29(3), 228-240.

Kim, S., Morgan, A. and Asseker, G. 2020. Examining the relationship between sport spectator motivation, involvement, and loyalty: a structural model in the context of Australian Rules football. Sport in Society, 42(1), https://doi.org/10.1080/17430437.2020.1720658.

Otte, F. W., Millar, S. K., and Klatt, S. 2020. What do you hear? The effect of stadium noise on football players’ passing performances. European Journal of Sport Science, DOI: 10.1080/17461391.2020.1809714.

Seering, J., Savage, S., Eagle, M., Churchin, J., Moeller, R., Bigham, J.P., and Hammer, J. 2017. Audience Participation Games: Blurring the Line Between Player and Spectator. Proceedings of the 2017 Conference on Designing Interactive Systems. 429–440. https://doi.org/10.1145/3064663.3064732

Stander, F.W., and Van Zyl, L.E. 2016. See you at the match: Motivation for sport consumption and intrinsic psychological reward of premier football league spectators in South Africa. SA Journal of Industrial Psychology, 42(1), http://dx.doi.org/10.4102/sajip.v42i1.1312.

Yim, B., and Byon, K.K. 2018. The Influence of Emotions on Game and Service Satisfaction and Behavioral Intention in Winning and Losing Situations: Moderating Effect of Identification with the Team. Sport Marketing Quarterly, 27(2):93-107.

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