The club support intention of J. League spectators

Abstract

The objective of this study is to confirm the intentions of J. League spectators to support a club. Specifically, data was collected from 619 J. League supporters, and a hypothetical model that assumes a relationship among attachment , team identification, and club support intentions was examined using structural equation modeling. In addition , to verify the difference in the intensity of supportive behavior, supporter-club members and non-members and supporter-association members and non-members were compared. From the results, it was observed that team identification and attachment to a fan community affected club support intentions, and among the two, the effect of the former was stronger. Further, no differences were observed that compared supporter-club members and non-members. In the comparison between supporter-association members and non-members, differences were observed in the relationship between attachment to a fan community and club support intentions and that between attachment to a local city and team identification.