Communication
During every sporting event there is always positive and negative communication. At a local sporting event, featuring a peewee league of young boys, I observed how fans communicated with each other and found it was primarily based on which team they were for, as well as if they felt their favorite player was being treated fairly. I assumed before my observation began that positive and negative communication would be relatively equal throughout the day. My hypothesis was based on the idea that if fans of the same team acted positively toward one another and fans of opposing teams acted negatively toward one another, interactions would be roughly the same. As the game wore on, I found there were more negative interactions, both verbally and non-verbally, than positive interactions.
Upon attending the local sporting event, I anticipated there would be both positive and negative interactions between fans. Prior to arriving, I postulated positive interactions would take place between fans who were cheering for the same team, while negative reactions would take place between fans who were cheering for opposing teams. My data revealed this to be relatively seventy-five percent correct. Within the first thirty minutes of the game, several positive interactions between fans cheering for the same team were observed. A certain type of camaraderie was witnessed between fans of the same team as they cheered for one side, while simultaneously ostracizing those who cheered for a different team. It was strange, however, because all of these individuals lived in the same community, and the individuals playing were young children between the ages of nine and eleven. Regardless, positive interactions included shaking hands, high-fiving, yelling variations of, “Here we go,” “Way to go,” or, “That’s our team,” and sharing food and beverages. Proxemics also revealed positive communication. Fans cheering for the same team were twice as likely to smile, touch, or sit near others who were dressed in the colors of a team they favored, or who were actively cheering for a team they favored.
Negative communication unsurprisingly took place between fans of the opposing teams. Proxemics was the most revealing. Many fans of the opposing teams avoided one another completely. They sat on opposite sides of the field, or on separate sides of the bleachers. Some were inadvertently forced near one another due to arriving late, but attempted to sit as near to their party as possibly. They smiled or waved to others, presumably in their community, out of politeness, but showed more camaraderie to individuals who were fans of the same team. They did not share with individuals who were not cheering for the same team, nor did they speak with enthusiasm to individuals who were cheering for the opposite team. On five separate occasions, fans of the opposing teams spoke angrily to one another, displaying verbal violence. One individual’s son was the victim of a violent play on the field. Though it was within the bounds of the game’s rules, the individual threatened the other boy’s father, stating if his son was hit like that again he would take it out on the man’s car. This was the most negative display of communication witnessed throughout the event.
Something I did not anticipate was negative communication between individuals cheering for the same team. Some fans became jealous or upset when their family members and friends were not given as much playing time as other children. Coaches and referees remained professional and stayed focused on the game and the children; the fans began taking their aggression out on one another. They began making passive aggressive comments to other individuals who were cheering for the same team, and showed less positive non-verbal communication. An entire family moved to the opposite side of the field when the player they had been cheering for was placed on the bench. This action spoke very loudly because the opposite side of the field was occupied primarily with fans cheering for the opposing team. Many fans appeared happy when this particular player was taken out of the game, as well, which could be labeled as negative communication. A separate woman, upset about the small amount of time her son had been allotted to play before he was pulled from the game, removed him from the field and left before yelling something inaudible at another family. Despite the fact that I do not know what was said, all non-verbal communication alludes to the fact it was negative communication. I did not expect negative communicative exchanges between fans cheering for the same team for obvious reasons. However, after contemplation I can understand why it took place.
In sum, many of the interactions that took place during the game were expected. Positive communication between fans of the same team was not a surprise. It was also not a surprise that fans of opposing teams displayed negative communication toward one another. I hypothesized the day would reveal a fifty-fifty split between positive and negative interactions, but found this to be untrue due to unrest among fans of the same team. It was surprising to find fans of the same team acting negatively toward one another, both verbally and non-verbally, and it proved my initial hypothesis incorrect. Fans at local sporting events, even for children, display primarily negative interactions when they are communicating.
