Comparison Between Various Corporate Social Responsibility Initiatives Based on Spectators’ Attitudes and Attendance Intention for a Professional Baseball Franchise

Abstract

The effects of different corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives-child and family, community relations, health and wellness, and environment protection-were compared in this study based on spectators’ attitudes toward a sports franchise and event attendance intention. A total of 354 spectators were recruited from the Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL) in Taiwan. A quasi-experimental design was used as the research design, and a one-way multivariate analysis of covariance was conducted for data analysis. The results of this study indicate that spectators perceive the environment protection initiative to be more persuasive in terms of the attitude of sports spectators toward sports franchises and event attendance intention than child and family and health and wellness initiatives. Additionally, community relation initiatives are perceived to be more effective than child and family initiatives in terms of consumers’ attitudes toward sports franchises and event attendance intention. This article contributes both theoretical and practical knowledge and implications to CSR studies pertaining to sports from an Asian perspective.