To read this content please select one of the options below:

Sport event tourists’ (SET’s) behavior: a case study of the PyeongChang Winter Olympics

Jinwoo Park (Department of Hospitality and Tourism Management, University of North Texas, Denton, Texas, USA)
Minhong Kim (Department of Kinesiology, University of North Texas, Denton, Texas, USA)
John Nauright (College of Business, Lock Haven University of Pennsylvania, Lock Haven, Pennsylvania, USA)
Young Hoon Kim (Department of Hospitality and Tourism Management, University of North Texas, Denton, Texas, USA)

International Journal of Sports Marketing and Sponsorship

ISSN: 1464-6668

Article publication date: 14 January 2020

Issue publication date: 24 April 2020

619

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationships among athlete star power, enjoyment and revisit intention of sport event tourists in a sport mega-event (SME).

Design/methodology/approach

This study was conducted in the context of 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games. A total of 419 respondents completed a survey. Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the data.

Findings

This study proved the final structure model fit well by having the values and scores higher than the minimum cutoff in all categories. Path coefficients indicate that H1a, H1c and H2 were supported while H1b was not supported by the analysis. In addition, enjoyment partially mediated the relationship between athlete star power and revisit intentions. In particular, two mediating effects were found: enjoyment mediated trustworthiness and revisit intention and expertise and revisit intention. However, enjoyment did not mediate the relationship between attractiveness and revisit intentions.

Research limitations/implications

The limitation of this study lies within two perspectives. Since the data have been collected in one country, the results may be viewed and interpreted for a specific location and time. Thus, it is strongly recommended to conduct the similar studies in the future Olympic Games. In the other perspective, the results could be different from one to another sport game because of the popularity by star power and game itself.

Originality/value

This study adds the literature on sport event research. Although there were a few studies on the effect of athlete star power, a dearth of research examined the relationships among athlete star power (trustworthiness, attractiveness and expertise), enjoyment and revisit intention. These results are valuable to SME managers to increase the propensity of tourists’ revisit intention at sport mega-event by understanding the factors that lead to increased tourist enjoyment.

Keywords

Citation

Park, J., Kim, M., Nauright, J. and Kim, Y.H. (2020), "Sport event tourists’ (SET’s) behavior: a case study of the PyeongChang Winter Olympics", International Journal of Sports Marketing and Sponsorship, Vol. 21 No. 2, pp. 267-284. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSMS-09-2019-0101

Publisher

:

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2019, Emerald Publishing Limited

Related articles