Abstract
Home advantage in sports has been extensively researched in the academic literature over the past five decades. A review of the literature reveals several factors that consistently underly this phenomenon. One of the most documented is the home crowd effect. While the crowd effect on the results has been widely researched considering noise, size, and density, there are conflicting findings of the effect and its extent. Furthermore, the perceptions of fans, athletes, coaches, and officials of the causes of home advantage in general and the crowd effect in particular, remain marginal. This is especially important in the face of significant regulation changes in the stands caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The current study, therefore, examined the perceptions of fans, athletes, coaches, and officials of the Israeli handball premier league regarding fans’ contribution to the home advantage phenomenon along with other factors (e.g., travel and officiating). A questionnaire examining perceptions regarding home advantage was distributed to 232 Israeli participants (117 fans, 59 players, 26 coaches, and 30 officials). Results, based on MANOVA, ANOVA, and post-hoc analyses, indicated significant differences in participants’ perceptions of the different factors in general and the crowd factor in particular. Overall, the crowd was perceived as the most important factor contributing to the home advantage phenomenon (M = 5.7). Furthermore, fans perceived their contribution (i.e., the crowd) significantly higher than the rest of the participants (p = 0.001; i.e., players, coaches, and officials). On the other hand, officials ranked their contribution to the home advantage effect as low as well as significantly under ranked their contribution in comparison to the other groups (p < 0.001). This result suggests that officials perceive themselves as relatively robust to the crowd effect compared to the other participants. Additional results are discussed in light of existing gaps in the literature on the home advantage phenomenon. Alongside the theoretical contribution, these findings contribute to applied implications of increasing the home advantage effect when playing at home and negating the home advantage when playing away.
Highlights
Schwartz and Barsky (1977) had suggested a systematic theoretical framework which consists of three, mostly physical and external oriented, factors as the cause of home advantage
All the officials in the study reported that while other officials are slightly affected by the fans, they are immune to such an effect
Descriptive statistics revealed that the crowd was perceived as the most important factor in the home advantage phenomenon
Summary
Schwartz and Barsky (1977) had suggested a systematic theoretical framework which consists of three, mostly physical and external oriented, factors as the cause of home advantage. In a study conducted in 2021 during the global Covid pandemic, Wunderlich et al (2021) found that while the crowd influences some elements of the game such as referee decisions and home team opportunities, it has no significant effect on home advantage in general, probably due to the dominance of other factors In this vein, Fischer and Haucap (2020) have postulated that the crowd impact on home advantage should be considered negligible compared to the importance of psychological factors. The rugby players suggested sleeping arrangements and familiarity with the weather as crucial variables Among these various factors, field familiarity was found to be perceived as the most important factor for athletes as well as coaches (Bray et al, 1998; Gayton et al, 2001; Fothergill et al, 2014). Similar perceptions were found among officials and fans regarding the fans’ involvement in home advantage through their ability to affect athletes’ performances
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