Sport in our society takes on many important roles. For people choosing to play, it enables people to participate in physically active competitions, even elevating a select few to heights which benefit them financially. Further, sport practitioners frequently like to communicate the many positive outcomes associated with sport participation, such as learning to face adversity, play within a team setting (even for some playing sports such as tennis and golf), and learn important lessons about preparation and critical thinking (Coakley, 2009).1
For people that consume sport, sport fans, following a sport and team, present both positive and negative outcomes. For example, following a team can help people socialize and acclimate to their environments (Wann & Robinson, 2002). Additionally, identifying with a sport team can alleviate feelings of loneliness or depression (Branscombe & Wann, 1991). Placing oneself into an identified group based on what that membership communicates about an individual is known as social identity theory (Tajfel, 1978). Typically, individuals chose to associate with groups in which they currently or desire to share characteristics. For example, in sport, if someone sees themselves as hardworking, they may choose a team that exemplifies a blue collar ethic such as the Pittsburgh Steelers or Nebraska Cornhuskers (Aden, 2008).
Sport is also a consumer product that many people in society enjoy. Sport is consumed through attendance, participation, watching on television or the Internet, reading content, and wearing and purchasing merchandise of favorite teams, leagues, and sports. An important part of the consumer product that is sport is the competition between players and fans (Kilduff, Elfenbein, & Staw, 2010), and how such competition impacts fans. For instance, the competition between players and teams allows supporters of those entities to vicariously compare with others. This comparison is the crux of rivalry within the sport context. As such, rivalry influences many aspects of sport and the consumer product known as spectator sport. This book focuses on the rivalry phenomenon in the sport setting and offers readers with key findings and tools to help further understand how the simple identification with a sport team influences the disparate way groups and individual perceive and treat others. The rest of the introductory chapter provides brief descriptions of the chapters and topics covered throughout the rest of the book. Further, this introduction also informs readers of issues such as the various stakeholders that could utilize the information in this text along with the best ways to use this text.
Chapters and Topics
Chapter 2 introduces readers to the rivalry phenomenon by providing an in-depth literature review of the subject, from within and outside of the sport setting. Additionally, the chapter discusses the role of the sport organization in properly and responsibly promoting rivalry in a way that increases fan and consumer engagement while trying to avoid also increasing animosity, deviance, and potential violence among team supporters. The chapter also provides examples of responsible and irresponsible promotion of rivalry among teams. Chapter 3 introduces readers to the Sport Rivalry Fan Perception Scale (SRFPS: Havard, Gray, Gould, Sharp, & Schaffer, 2013), an instrument that measures how fans perceive rival teams and supporters. The chapter also illustrates how the instrument is used to measure fan perceptions of rival teams in different situations. Specifically, the chapter investigates contact hypothesis by comparing rival perceptions between fans that have visited the city or university where a rival team plays for reasons other than a sport competition with fans that have not visited for reasons other than sport competition. From there, the chapter then transitions into an investigation of how relative proximity influences rival perceptions by examining fans of the Colorado Buffaloes, Colorado State Rams, and Wyoming Cowboys, three teams that all compete in collegiate football in the United States and are located reasonably close to each other.
Chapter 4 introduces Glory Out of Reflected Failure (GORFing), a term that explains how some fans cheer and celebrate when a rival team loses to someone other than their favorite team (Havard, 2014). The indirect failure of a rival group is something that can make in-group members feel better about their group, and thereby, better about themselves. The chapter discusses a modified instrument to measure GORFing and examines how the phenomenon influences fan consumption of favorite team merchandise. Chapter 5 presents a call to action for practitioners and researchers on future ways to promote and investigate rivalry. It is imperative that both practitioners and researchers gain more understanding of the rivalry phenomenon and seek ways to decrease the occurrences of derogations and overly negative interactions between competing group members.
Chapter 6 introduces readers to Sport Rivalry Man and the Sport Rivalry Man Curriculum. The curriculum was created in an effort to teach the public about the rivalry phenomenon and was developed with the primary focus that education leads to increased understanding and positive influence on behavior. At this time, five lessons in the curriculum package have been produced using standards set by the American School Counselor Association (ASCA). Specifically, lessons currently address issues important to young readers such as online and school bullying, kindness/acceptance, decision making, and teamwork. Chapter 7 provides a conclusion to the materials discussed in the book and provides researchers and practitioners with additional streams of research and inquiry.
How to Use This Book
This text is presented in a way so that it adds support to researchers, practitioners, and students within and outside of the sport setting. This section discusses the key audiences for this book and how to best utilize the text. Chapters within this text are written in a fashion that one could read the text from beginning to end and see the story of how rivalry influences fan and group member behavior. In this approach, people reading the text first learn about what rivalry is ...