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Biddeford, Maine
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Deirdre Fleming Stires

New research by UNE business professor breaks down what makes NFL fans tick

UNE’s Aimee Vlachos named Maine’s Outdoor Industry Leader of the Year
Aimee Vlachos, Ed.D., associate teaching professor

Why does one football fan obsess over every third-down conversion while another just wants to know when to start yelling? A new study co-authored by Aimee Vlachos, Ed.D., an associate teaching professor at the University of New England, suggests that it comes down to the distinct ways fans experience the game and process it cognitively and emotionally. 

The study, “Thinking, Feeling, and Watching: Cognitive–Emotional Archetypes of NFL Fan Engagement,” that was recently published in The Sport Journal and co-written with Jimmy Rooney, an entrepreneur in mobile gaming, has real implications for how the NFL and sports broadcasters build the fan experience going forward, Vlachos said. 

Prior research only looked at fan engagement as a one-dimensional construct without exploring how fans differ cognitively and emotionally in the ways they engage in televised sports.

Vlachos said the study shows how a fan glued to their phone during a nail-biter isn’t necessarily less “into it” than the person breaking down an NFL coach’s choice of plays — they’re just engaged differently.

“That’s why I like The Sport Journal — they understood how this could benefit the NFL or a particular football team, not just academia. This is more real-life, practical research that can be used for something,” said Vlachos, program director of the Outdoor Business and Innovation program in UNE’s College of Business.

Rooney, who is a member of the family that owns the Pittsburgh Steelers, said when he turned to sports media and game design three years ago, he sought to deliver through digital media an experience of “inquiry, connection, and community” for sports fans.

He turned almost immediately to work with Vlachos, who has welcomed Rooney’s father, Jim Rooney, as a guest speaker in her sports governance class. The two collaborated on how Vlachos’ business students could beta test Rooney’s football-fan-engagement fantasy coaching game to help Rooney in his goal to offer sports fans an immersive experience.

The research set out to answer a simple question: Do all engaged fans watch football the same way? The answer, it turns out, is no.

“The research that I began at UNE with Dr. Vlachos last fall was really helpful for me because I tend to get caught up in this biased assumption… that everyone who sits down to unwind with football on TV is also looking to immerse in a high-effort learning journey with football and treat their entertainment time as if they are straight-A, high-achieving students,” Rooney said. “This research has helped me to plot out more specifically when and how different kinds of fans might be enticed to puzzle out the strategy their favorite teams might use.”

Vlachos and Rooney started with more than 50 in-depth interviews with football fans, then used those conversations to build a survey that was completed by 422 NFL viewers. 

Using statistical clustering methods, the researchers sorted respondents into five distinct fan “archetypes,” such as those who are highly analytical and second-guess coaching decisions, those who only tune in for big moments, those who watch football as a simple routine and tradition, those who bet on football based on their instincts, and those who are far less invested in watching football. 

Rooney said he hopes their research helps other media designers create fan-engagement games better to, ultimately, help the “overall ecosystem” of sports games grow bigger and better.

“I agreed to publish this research publicly because there are a lot of incredible tools and products in the football ecosystem that deliver this higher quality experience with football that I am working towards,” Rooney said. “The challenge that I see for my games and for other games is that, no matter how compelling these tools can be, they ultimately demand higher attention and higher intellectual effort that is challenging to sustain over time. 

“(This) research is useful because it helps designers more specifically plot out (exactly) when to try to captivate fans,” he said.

About the University of New England

The University of New England is Maine’s largest independent university, with two beautiful coastal campuses in Maine, a one-of-a-kind study-abroad campus in Tangier, Morocco, and an array of flexible online offerings. In an uncommonly welcoming and supportive community, we offer hands-on learning, empowering students to make a positive impact in a world full of challenges. We are the state’s top provider of health professionals and home to Maine’s only medical and dental colleges, physician assistant program, and pharmacy school, in addition to a variety of other interprofessionally aligned health care programs and nationally recognized programs in the marine sciences, the natural and social sciences, business, the humanities, and the arts.