According to the Team Identification-Social Psychological Health Model (Wann, 2006b), team identification and social psychological health should be positively correlated because identification leads to important social connections which, in turn, facilitate well-being. Although past research substantiates the hypothesized positive relationship between team identification and well-being, earlier studies focused solely on college student populations. The current study extended past work in this area by investigating the team identification/well-being relationship among older sport fans. A sample of older adults (N = 96; M age = 70.82) completed scales assessing demographics, identification with a local college basketball team, and measures of social psychological well-being. As hypothesized, team identification accounted for a significant proportion of unique variance in two measures of social psychological health (collective self-esteem and loneliness).

Investigated whether the predictive validity of the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) could be enhanced by having Ss complete the BDI under regular vs. a 6‐week projected response set. Six hundred students participated in the initial screening phase, in which they were administered the BDI under both standard and projected instructional sets. Two groups were indentified: High initial‐high projected (N = 17) and high initial‐low projected (N = 20). Additionally, a low initial‐low projected control group (N = 13) was selected. At 5 to 6 weeks follow‐up, these Ss again completed the BDI and were administered the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression as a criterion check. Except for the low‐low group, which changed little at follow‐up, the final BDIs were lower than initial BDIs. However, projected BDIs provided for more accurate classification than the initial screening BDI. Also, projected BDI scores were significant predictors of both final BDIs and the Hamilton ratings, whereas initial BDIs did not correlate significantly with either criterion. These data suggest that projected BDI protocols could serve as a practical alternative to more costly or time‐consuming methods of selection of research populations.

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