Sport consumption: exploring the duality of constructs in experiential research

Sport consumption: exploring the duality of constructs in experiential research

This paper explores the concepts of mood and involvement in experiential research. Sport spectating was chosen to represent leisure services in this investigation into the differences between traditional consumer decision-making constructs and experiential constructs. We propose that in leisure service encounters, both mood and involvement act as dynamic constructs operating on dual levels.

The first level is an 'a priori' state, or those brought to the experience by the consumer and the second level is an 'experiential' state, where constructs actually change over the course of the consumption experience. Further we propose that the servicescape moderates the changes in mood and involvement during the experience.

A review of the literature and a series of phenomenological focus groups, conducted during a sport consumption experience (watching a televised football game) facilitated the exploration of the propositions in this study. Phenomenological focus groups are considered a particularly appropriate choice for those wishing to explore consumer experience as they provide a systematic description in terms of first-degree constructs of the consumption-relevant intersubjectivity of the target segment.

Our findings suggest that mood and involvement are in fact dual constructs, operating on both a priori and experiential levels. In relation to mood, we noted that a priori mood, or the mood that the consumer enters or begins the experience with, is important in moderating satisfaction with the experience. We also found anecdotal evidence that this a priori state changes constantly during the consumption experience.

In the case of involvement, we found that events in a game could increase or decrease an individual’s involvement with the experience, while the level of involvement with the team for example tends to stay the same. This finding supports the suggestion by Hirschman and Holbrook (1982) that the dynamic nature of involvement was proposed to be a factor of the longitudinal nature of experiences such as football games which are experienced over time, and during which preferred patterns of arousal may be violated.

In conclusion this study, though truly exploratory in nature, provides one step toward improving the level of understanding as to the nature of the person-experience interaction that most scholars agree influence marketing and other variables and that too few scholars explore thoroughly, by supporting the proposition that mood and involvement are not static constructs in experiential leisure services such as sport consumption. In contrast to traditional product marketing, experiential leisure service consumption, such as sport spectating, force marketers to examine the consumption experience from a different perspective than that offered by the traditional consumer decision-making approach.

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