Sports Audiences Deliver More than Attractive Demos: Cross-Media Behaviors, Emotional Engagement and Attitude Toward Advertising

The sports industry is heavily reliant on revenue from media rights, which in turn depends on advertising revenue, yet little research has been done on the value of sports audiences to advertisers. Therefore, this study examined the effects demographics, sports-related cross-media behaviors and emotional engagement with sports on attitude toward advertising. Seven media behaviors, including television, Internet, and print, were measured on a 5-pt. scale anchored by never and daily, then summed into a single variable (α = .92). Emotional engagement was measured using a 7-pt. scale anchored by hate and love, then summed into a single variable (α = .91). Attitude toward advertising was measured using a single-item question about liking advertising in general on a 5-pt. scale. An online survey was administered to 810 US adults drawn from an online panel and a hierarchical regression was used to analyze results. Demographics, cross-media behaviors, and emotional engagement with sports were all significant predictors of attitude toward advertising (R2 = .195, p \u3c .001). Emotional engagement with sports was the greatest predictor of attitude toward advertising (β = .31), explaining an additional 6.3% of variance after controlling for demographics and cross-media behaviors