Development of the Spectator Motivation Inventory (SMI) for Professional Sports

Eddie T.C. Lam, Ph.D. (Department of HPERD, Cleveland State University, Cleveland, Ohio)

IntroductionIntroductionPrevious research studies indicated that variables affecting game attendance mainly came from the following four major areas: (a) game attractiveness (e.g., individual skills, presence of star players, team records, league standing, record-breaking performance, and closeness of competition), (b) schedule convenience (e.g., game time, day of week, and weather condition), (c) economics and marketing (e.g., ticket price, marketing promotions, income, availability of substitute forms of entertainment, television effect, and competition from other entertainment events, and (d) sociodemographics (e.g., population, age, gender, ethnicity, occupation, and education) (Greenstein & Marcum, 1981; Hansen & Gauthier, 1989; Schofield, 1983; Zhang, Pease, Hui, & Michaud, 1995). These combined variables account for over 50% of game attendance variance (Baade & Tiehen, 1990; Marcum & Greenstein, 1985; Noll, 1991; Whitney, 1988).

Most research studies examined the determinants of spectator attendance were concentrated on professional or minor league baseball games (e.g., Becker & Suls, 1983; Wakefield, 1995); minor league hockey games (e.g., Zhang, Pease, Smith, Lee, Lam, & Jambor, 1997); professional basketball games (e.g., Zhang, Pease, Hui, & Michaud, 1995); and Division I college football games (e.g., Kahle, Kambara, & Rose, 1996; Kwon & Trail, 2001). However, little research has been done on minor league games such as football (i.e., Arena Football League).

MethodMethodThe purpose of this study was to develop the Spectator Motivation Inventory (SMI) to examine factors that might have influenced fans’ decision to attend arena football home games. Development of the SMI was carried out in two steps: (a) formulation of the preliminary scale and test of content validity, and (b) test administration and an exploratory factor analysis. The initial SMI scale was developed based on a thorough review of related literature and field observation. Two university professors in sport management and two senior administrators of the arena football team participated in the test of content validity in terms of item relevance, representativeness, and clarity. Moreover, information on the sociodemogrpahic background (gender, age, marital status, household size, household income, ethnicity, education, and occupation) of the respondents was also developed.

ResultsResultsThe 30-item SMI was administrated to spectators during an arena football game (2008) in a large metropolitan area in the Midwest region of the United States. Item responses were based on a 7-point Likert scale (e.g., 7 = very much/very important, 1 = not at all/not important). The SMI was distributed before the start and during the game using the random cluster sampling method. A total of 391 questionnaires were collected by the end of the game. The sample included male (64%) and female (36%) fans. Most spectators (74%) were between the ages of 18 and 50 years old.

The sample size of this study was appropriate for factor analysis, which required a minimum of 200-300 respondents (Comrey, 1988; Guadagnoli & Velicer, 1988). Using the FACTOR REDUCTION procedure from the SPSS for Windows (SPSS, 2004), it was found that the two-factor structure was most interpretable as identified by the alpha extraction method. After examining the pattern matrix from the promax rotation, it was found that two items had a loading less than .30 and were discarded from the scale. All remaining items of the SMI had a factor loading of .42 or higher. As a result of this refinement, the SMI included two factors and 28 items: Decision (16 items) and Promotion (12 items). These two factors explained a total variance of 53.87%. Results of the pattern matrix is presented in Table 1.

Using the SCALE (Reliability Analysis) procedures from the SPSS for Windows (SPSS, 2004), alpha reliability coefficients (Cronbach, 1951) were computed for the two retained factors. The alpha reliability coefficients of the Decision and Promotion factors were .932, and .929, respectively. These coefficients suggested that all items under each factor were reliable in estimating their respective construct.

Table 1: Factor Loadings of the Two-Factor Spectator Motivation Inventory (N = 391)

ConclusionConclusionBased on the results of the exploratory factor analysis and alpha reliability coefficients (above .90), the SMI is a reliable scale in measuring spectators’ decisions in attending arena football games. Since this study is limited to a sample of spectators attending a regular season arena football home game in the Midwest region of the United States, the results may not be generalized to other sports or regions. For this reason, the SMI may need minor modification (some items) and validation (e.g., confirmatory factor analysis) when it is applied to samples from other sports or settings.

I II

Affordable Ticket 0.42 0.13Indoors 0.48 0.08Family Environment 0.45 0.07Pre-Game Show 0.79 0.00Fireworks 0.71 -0.03Dance Team 0.72 -0.15Kickoff Crew 0.81 -0.07Kickoff Crew Cheerleaders 0.77 -0.15Video Board Content 0.78 0.01Emcees Munch & Leah 0.77 0.02Autograph Session 0.62 0.14Mascot 0.82 0.01In-Arena Contests 0.75 0.03Crowd Enthusiasm 0.63 0.14Half-time Entertainment 0.78 -0.07Ticket Discount/Promotion 0.48 0.05Television Advertising 0.00 0.74Newspaper Advertising 0.08 0.70Direct Mail 0.11 0.60E-mail Offer -0.07 0.69Radio Advertising -0.03 0.79Giveaways -0.10 0.80Promoting Star Players 0.05 0.76Mini-Pack Ticket Plans 0.07 0.75Word-of-mouth 0.00 0.70Good Public Relations -0.06 0.82Group Sales/Discount -0.07 0.64Outdoor Billboards/Signs 0.12 0.68