Abstract
Baseball spectating is one of the most popular leisure activities in Asia. Leisure participants with high well-being levels usually demonstrate loyal behavior to the teams they follow. Previous research indicates that professional sport fans are serious leisure participants and their participation has career qualities. The goal of this research was to investigate the relationship of leisure involvement with the well-being of professional sport fans and the possible mediating effect of organizational commitment, a career-related characteristic, on well-being. Some 406 fans of the Brother Elephants Baseball Team in Taiwan were surveyed. The results showed that leisure involvement positively and significantly influenced fans’ well-being and organizational commitment partially mediated the influence of leisure involvement on well-being. This study pioneers the integration of leisure involvement, well-being and organizational commitment in the context of a Professional Baseball League team within Asia. Implications and future research directions are presented.
Highlights
In Asia, professional sport is not yet as vibrant as in the USA and Europe and the current population of sport fans is smaller
The findings revealed that the leisure involvement of baseball fans has a positive impact on their well-being
This research explored the relationship between the leisure involvement and well-being of baseball fans
Summary
In Asia, professional sport is not yet as vibrant as in the USA and Europe and the current population of sport fans is smaller. The total attendance reached 10 million in 1997 [1] but the population of Taiwan is only 23 million. These statistics indicate that baseball spectating is a favorite leisure activity that has blended into the lifestyles of Taiwanese. The success of professional sports is derived from fans’ support and developing a loyal fan base is a fundamental aim of professional sport organizations [2]. Loyal fans travel to baseball fields around Taiwan to support their teams [3,4]. Much previous academic research has focused on sport fans’ loyalty. Studies on well-being generated by sport remain scarce [16]
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