Social Identity Theory in Sports Fandom Research

Introduction

Through a series of seminal articles in the 1970s, social psychologists developed a new research tradition based on social identity theory, “that part of an individual’s self-concept which derives from his knowledge of his membership of a social group (or groups) together with the emotional significance attached to that membership” (Tajfel, 1974, p. 69). European scholars such as Henri Tajfel and John C. Turner employed social identity theory to examine intergroup relations, group processes, and the social self (Hogg, Terry, & White, 1995). At the same time, a groundbreaking study for sports fandom research demonstrated that university students had a greater tendency to wear school-identifying apparel following a victory by the school football team, decreasing their distance from a successful group with which they were only trivially associated (Cialdini et al., 1976). This scholarship prompted work on the phenomena of BIRGing, or basking in reflected glory after a team victory, and CORFing, cutting off reflected failure following a loss (Snyder et al., 1986; Wann & Branscombe, 1990).

Working in separate disciplines, scholars interested in social identity and BIRGing and CORFing started to explore similar questions about how group memberships shape a person’s self-image. More than four decades later, sports researchers are beginning to utilize social identity more frequently in studies on how mass communication can heighten fans’ identification with sports teams and athletes, answering calls for research on the interaction between sports media narratives and identity variables (Billings, 2011). This chapter aims to achieve two goals: (a) to chart the simultaneous developments of social identity theory and BIRGing and CORFing, including research influences and seminal studies, and (b) to explain how social identity has served and can continue to be utilized as the theoretical backbone for important scholarship on mass-mediated sports fandom.