Science studies why fans have deep ties to teams

It has long been assumed that ardent sports fans derive excitement and a sense of community from rooting for a big-time team. But a growing body of scientific evidence suggests that, for some fans, the ties go much deeper.

Some researchers have found that fervent fans become so tied to their teams that they experience hormonal surges and other physiological changes while watching games, much as the athletes themselves do.

The self-esteem of some male and female fans also rises and falls with a game's outcome, with losses affecting their optimism about everything from getting a date to playing darts, one study showed.

Science is still grappling with many questions about why people form such deep ties to sports teams, and it has not yet rigorously confronted what may be the core question: Is avidly rooting for a team good or bad for someone's health? But there are early clues, some of them surprising.

Psychologists have long suspected that many diehard fans are lonely, alienated people searching for self-esteem by identifying with a sports team. But a study at the University of Kansas suggests just the opposite -- that sports fans suffer fewer bouts of depression and alienation than do people who are uninterested in sports.

One theory traces the roots of fan psychology to a primitive time when human beings lived in small tribes and warriors fighting to protect tribes were true genetic representatives of their people, psychologists say.

In modern society, professional and college athletes play a similar role for a city in the stylized war on a playing field, the theory goes. Even though professional athletes are mercenaries in every sense, their exploits may re-create the intense emotions in some fans that tribal warfare may have in their ancestors. It may also be these emotions that have in large part fueled the explosion in the popularity of sports over the last two decades.

"Our sports heroes are our warriors," said Robert Cialdini, a professor of psychology at Arizona State University. "This is not some light diversion to be enjoyed for its inherent grace and harmony. The self is centrally involved in the outcome of the event. Whoever you root for represents you."

Cialdini pioneered research on fans in the 1970s. He began by documenting that college sports fans were far more likely to wear clothing with their team's logo on the day after victories than after defeats, a phenomenon he called "basking in reflected glory."

"It becomes possible to attain some sort of respect and regard not by one's own achievements but by one's connection to individuals of attainment," he said.

His later research showed that sports fans tend to claim credit for a team's success, saying "we won" to describe a victory, but tend to distance themselves from a team's failure, saying "they lost" when describing a defeat.

But Cialdini's initial theories did not cover all spectators, since some deeply committed fans, like the long suffering souls who love the Chicago Cubs, remain loyal and fiercely attached to their idols despite years of failure.

Studies over the last decade showed that while the run-of-the- mill spectator may abandon a team once it starts losing, more committed fans, ride the same emotional roller-coaster as the athletes themselves.

In 1993, psychologists at the University of Kansas came up with a survey for measuring a fan's attachment to his team. The scale divides fans into high, low and moderate identification, based on their responses to seven written questions.

A raft of studies since then have that found "highly identified" fans -- both men and women -- not only are less likely to abandon a team when it is doing poorly, but tend to blame their team's failures on officiating or bad luck rather than the other team's skill. They also exhibit higher levels of physiological arousal at games, spend more money on tickets and merchandise and enjoy generally higher self- esteem than people uninterested in sports.

"It's the highly identified fans who demonstrate this fierce connection and feel elation and dejection along with the team," Cialdini said.

Gene Hamm, a 37-year-old elevator mechanic from Staten Island, says his passion for the New York Mets, ignited in his boyhood during their wondrous 1969 season, has never been extinguished. He watches every game he can on television, his emotions rising and falling with every pitch, every hit, every managerial decision.

"I actually feel myself sitting on the couch managing the team," he said.

Hamm spent months at home last year, recuperating from a job- related injury, and he said watching the Mets kept him from slipping into depression. Then Kenny Rogers walked in the winning run to seal the Atlanta Braves' victory over the Mets in the playoffs.

"You don't walk in the winning run," he said, looking as if he had swallowed a glass of lemon juice. "I really wish they could have won last year. That would have made me feel so much better."

Some recent studies suggest that some fans experience physiological changes during a game or when shown photos of their team.

A study in Georgia has shown, for instance, that testosterone levels in male fans rise markedly after a victory and drop just as sharply after a defeat. The same pattern has been documented in male animals who fight over a mate: Biologists theorize that mammals may have evolved this way to ensure quick resolutions to conflicts.

James Dabbs, a psychologist at Georgia State University, tested saliva samples from different groups of sports fans before and after important games.

In one test, Dabbs took saliva samples from 21 Italian and Brazilian men in Atlanta before and after Brazil's victory over Italy in soccer's 1994 World Cup. The Brazilians' testosterone rose 28 percent on average, while the Italians' levels dropped 27 percent.

In another study, at the University of Utah, Dabbs and a colleague, Paul Bernhardt, found that male college basketball fans whose responses to a questionnaire indicated they had a low opinion of themselves registered the highest surges in testosterone after a win.

Dabbs said in an interview that the results suggest fans empathize with the competitors to such a degree that they mentally project themselves into the game and experience the same hormonal surges athletes do. The contest, however, must be an important one, like a playoff game, he said.

"We really are tribal creatures," he said.

Charles Hillman, a psychologist now at the University of Illinois, found that ardent football fans at the University of Florida experienced extreme physiological arousal when they viewed pictures of Gators football stars making game-winning plays, but responded indifferently to pictures of other athletes and teams.

"Individuals that are highly identified with the team show extreme arousal compared to the average fan," he said.

Among zealous male and female fans, Hillman's study found, the level of arousal -- measured by heart rate, brain waves and perspiration -- was comparable to what the fans registered when shown erotic photos or pictures of animal attacks, he said.

For some fans, the emotional roller coaster of watching a game can be addictive. John Herde, a 65-year-old accountant in Manhattan, has been attending Rangers' games since he was a teen-ager and owns season tickets. He remembers sitting in the upper rows of the old Madison Square Garden as a boy and banging on the ceiling when the team scored.

What has brought him back to hockey games again and again, he says, is the catharsis he feels when he gives free rein to his anger or gloats openly in triumph.

"It's a release," he said. "You can yell and scream and do whatever. It's like therapy."

Edward Hirt of the University of Indiana has demonstrated that an ardent fan's self-esteem tends to track a team's performance.

Working with fans of Indiana University's basketball teams, Hirt showed zealous fans pictures of very attractive members of the opposite sex after a game and asked them to rate their ability to get a date with that person.

The results demonstrated that men and women who were diehard fans were much more optimistic about their sex appeal after a victory. They were also more sanguine about their ability to perform well at mental and physical tests, like darts and word games, Hirt found. When the team lost, that optimism evaporated.

"People identify themselves with a team through thick and thin," he said. "Your self-esteem will go up and down as your team does well or poorly."

Hirt said the desire to belong to a group or society -- a need once fulfilled mostly by religious and political organizations -- may explain why some fans remain loyal despite the repeated failure of their teams. Fans of the Chicago Cubs, he pointed out, have not enjoyed a World Series championship since 1908. Yet Wrigley Field sells out almost every game.

Fans of the New York Jets present another example. The team has not won a championship since 1969, when Joe Namath led the Jets to a Super Bowl. In 1985, the Jets moved from Shea Stadium in Queens to Giants Stadium in New Jersey, where they are a tenant in another team's home.

Edward Anzalone, a New York City firefighter, said he became fascinated with the Jets when he was a boy in the 1960s, and despite 30 years without a championship, has never lost faith in the team.

"It's an obsession," he says. "The fans went over to New Jersey and are still hanging tough, even with no Stadium and not winning a Super Bowl since 1969."

These days, Anzalone, who is 40, is better known as Fireman Eddie to Jets' fans. Every game, he rides on his brother Frank's shoulders, wearing a green and white fire helmet and leading the fans in a J-E- T-S chant. His devotion to the team has gained him some notoriety of his own.

Anzalone's house in College Point, Queens, is painted green, the Jets' color. He will only drive a green car. The room of his 3-year- old son Tyler is a shrine to the team, with footballs signed by several Jets' most valuable players, a hat signed by Bill Parcells and a team jacket from 1966.

He says he still suffers with every loss. When Vinny Testaverde, the Jets' quarterback, ruptured his Achilles' tendon early in the opening game last season, Anzalone went to bed. "I was sick to my stomach," he said. "I was sick that day. I knew the year was shot."

In most cases, this deep attachment to a team can be healthy, studies have found. Daniel Wann, a psychologist at Murray State University in Kentucky, has done several studies showing that an intense interest in a team can buffer people from depression and foster feelings of self-worth and belonging.

In 1991, Wann studied students at the University of Kansas, demonstrating that ardent fans of basketball and baseball teams had higher levels of self-esteem and suffered fewer bouts of depression than did people who were not followers of sports.

"So many of the traditional institutions are beginning to break down, religion and family," Wann said. "The human psyche is the same and something has to take the place of that. Sports fills an important void."

Michelle Musler, one of the most visible Knicks' fans in New York, acknowledges that her 27-year love affair with the team may have had its genesis in loneliness.

It began in the early 1970s. She was working, had been through a divorce and had five children to raise. Once in a while, she said, she got tickets from her company to Knicks games.

"My ex-husband ran away with the lady next door and I didn't seem to fit into suburbia anymore," she said. "The Knicks gave me a purpose, something to do, a place to go. As a fan, I guess, there is a sense of belonging. That you are a part of something."

Musler, 63, became a season-ticket holder in 1974 and has only missed a handful of games since. A business consultant, she plans her travel each year around the Knicks' schedule, tapes road games to watch later and hoards newspaper accounts of her team. She once flew through the night after an 18-hour day of work to make it back from Hong Kong in time for a game.

She has lost some friends over the Knicks, when she turned down invitations to weddings and graduations because they conflicted with the playoffs. These sacrifices, however, have repaid her, she says, with new friends who share her obsession: sports writers, team officials, season ticket holders and other fans.

"What has happened through the years is that the Knicks have become my social life," she said.

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