Investigation of spectator reasons to watch sporting events: Sample of university students

The purpose of the study was to determine the relevant factors that affect sport spectators? consumption behavior and to identify the relationship and differences of these factors according to the pre-determined variables. The population of the study was composed of university student who were sport event spectators. The sample group was composed of 209 students who were sampled through convenient sampling method. While there were two Likert Type scales developed by the researcher which were named External Motivations Scale for Sport Spectators and Internal Motivations Scale for Sport Spectators in the first and second sections of the main scale, which was composed of three sections, in the third section there was a personal information form for gathering demographic information. Initially, a literature review was done in the scale development process. Then, a semi-constructed qualitative interview was conducted with 12 groups (n=75). Based upon the data an item pool was formed and expert views were obtained accordingly. A pool with 113 items, in light of the feedbacks, was eventually reached ready to distribute. The population of the study done for validity or reliability comprised the university students who were spectating sport events. 415 questionnaires were taken into evaluation. The item pool was divided into two groups. External factors were composed of 48 items and internal factors group included 65 items. According to the exploratory factor analysis, which was conducted for the 48 items composing the External Motivations for Sport Spectators Scale, 34 items were grouped under 9 factors which had eigenvalues over 1. The Cronbach?s Alpha value for the total scale was .92. In the analysis of the Internal Motivations for Sport Spectators Scale, which was composed of 65 items, 40 items were grouped under 7 factors which had eigenvalues over 1. The Cronbach?s Alpha value of the total scale was .96. In the data analysis of the main study the means and standart deviations between sub-factors and independent variables were calculated. Also, independent t-test, Pearson Product Moment Correlation Analysis, One-way Variance Test was conducted to the data. Tukey and LSD tests were used as Post Hoc tests to analyze the differences provided through One-way Variance Analysis. As a result of the findings of the research, the variables such as gender, expenditure amount on watching sport competitions, being a licensed player, the level of fandom, the mostly-viewed sport discipline, watching the events in venues as a spectator, the frequency of viewing events on TV, mobile-phones or internet, the frequency of listening on the radio, the frequency of talking about sport, involving any sport activity could possibly be the determining factors which influence both internal and external motives for spectators. Key Words: Sport Spectator, Sporting Events, Watching Motivation