Social Influence of Sport Spectators

Abstract

Small changes and additions in comparison to the 2 nd version from June 30, 2022 3 rd version (July 7 th , 2022), preprint: 10.31234/osf.io/uet7f with small changes and additions in comparison to the 2 nd version from June 30 th , 2022 2 You have probably already experienced giving a presentation in front of a group of people. Were you influenced by the presence of your audience? Was your performance better, worse, or unaffected compared to the rehearsal session when you practiced alone? Is your performance influenced differently when the audience listens attentively as opposed to when they are noisily not paying attention? How does this presence of others impact performances and behaviors in the context of sports? In sports, social influence has already been investigated extensively (cf. Epting et al., 2011;Strauss, 2002b). A particular interest within social influence research is the home advantage in team sports (Allen & Jones, 2014;Carron et al., 2005). Research in this field is concerned with understanding whether the performance of the home team is better due to more of their fans being in the stadium.

Elite darts performance and the social influence of real crowds and simulated crowd noise

“…The absolute difference in 3DA, however, is negligibly small, with only half a point decrease with a real audience and increase with a simulated audience, which is practically irrelevant for winning in darts. Small effect sizes are in line with many studies on audience effects in other sports 5,32 . The hierarchical linear model for 3DA could explain more than 40% of the total variance in 3DA with an ICC of 12%.…”

“…These results help understand the effects of audiences in individual coordination-based sports: the presence of an audience decreases performance in a coordination-based sports task with high accuracy requirements. Several theories on the detrimental effects of an audience have been proposed in previous studies 5 . The deviation from the standard level of spectators (which for darts would be the no-audience condition, as most games are played behind closed doors) could lead to higher levels of social pressure and increase the likelihood of choking.…”

“…However, that game was played without any live spectators but with a simulated audience, where players would hear a crowd via speakers, yet no spectators were present, as 2 years ago, the PDC darts world championship had to be played mostly without a live audience because of the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic. Peter Wright, as he said himself, was not able to "switch on" during the game, as it "felt like [he] was playing at home" 4 .The investigation of the positive but also negative social influences of active and passive sport spectators or observers on performances of motor tasks is one of the oldest topics in sport psychology, sport sciences and sport economics (for a recent overview see e.g., the chapter by Strauss et al 5 or Wallace et al 6 ).With the COVID-19 pandemic starting in spring 2020, audiences were widely excluded from most of the sport events worldwide. A prominent example was the postponement of the Olympic games 2020 7 , which were nonetheless held without spectators 8 .…”

“…The investigation of the positive but also negative social influences of active and passive sport spectators or observers on performances of motor tasks is one of the oldest topics in sport psychology, sport sciences and sport economics (for a recent overview see e.g., the chapter by Strauss et al 5 or Wallace et al 6 ).…”