Athletic Events and Spectacular Spectators: A

Athletic programs in the public schools and colleges are often instifled by assertions that competitive team sports build character-e,nd SPortsmanship for participants and spectators, and that sport5. reinforce such school and community ideals as the virtues of competltion, patriotism, and the desirability of healthy living. Spectator beba vlor at public and sporting events at an intermountain nniverslty was examined in order to determine the relationship between the type of athletic event and fan aggression. Violence and fan aggression were found to be directly associated with the type of athletic event; hig h body contact sports (football) tend to inspire the greatest aggression, while individualized sports (track) inspire the least; other crowd-related variables were also found to be influential. The characteristics of the "sports subculture, " short's aleatory factors of delinquency, the frustration-aggression hypothesis, and the concept of catharsis were employed in a functional explanation of the occurrence of spectator aggression. Ten hypotheses were.developed and tested in support of the explanation, and recommendatlons for controlling or modifying spectator aggression are included. The authors suggest that individualized sports should be str?ssed Dore (along with the recommendations included for modifYlng spectator behavior) to counter the trend in sports violence. (Author