Ego involvement and passion for sport activities

Exploring relationships between ego involvement and passion for sport activities

A. Wade Wilson, PhD Candidate

Department of Recreation and Leisure Studies, University of Waterloo

Introduction​

People are often described as being “passionate” about a particular activity. However, relatively little is known about how certain activities can become obsessive and controlling versus more balanced aspects of people’s lives. We posit that the nature of people’s involvement with a particular activity can influence the extent to which that activity becomes a controllable or uncontrollable force in daily life. As such, this research explores relationships between ego involvement and passion towards competitive sport activities.

Vallerand (2010) indicates that the concept of passion has had many definitions over the years; however he suggests passion reflects a strong liking for an activity, object or concept. Being passionate involves being emotionally charged with, or at the least, being affectively inclined toward the object or activity (Vallerand). Moreover, it is often assumed that passion can bring out the best and the worst in people (Vallerand). Vallerand and colleagues (2003) put forth the Dualistic Model of Passion (DMP).Their model suggests that there are two types of passion: harmonious and obsessive. Specially, harmonious passion occurs when an activity is a welcomed or “nice” addition to one’s life. Conversely, obsessive passion occurs when an activity takes over one’s life. Recently, leisure researchers (e.g., Stenseng, 2008; Stenseng & Phelps, 2013) have found that harmonious passion was positively related to subjective well-being and positive outcomes in life domains (i.e., school, work, relationship with family and friends). By contrast, obsessive passion has been negatively related to subjective well-being and to positive life domain outcomes (Stenseng & Phelps). In summary, researchers have examined outcomes of harmonic and obsessive passion. Scant attention, however, has been paid to what factors might influence or contribute to these two types of passion (i.e., the potential “antecedents of passion). We believe the construct of ego involvement might provide useful insights in this regard. Indeed, our use of involvement in this way may help challenge the notion that engagement in leisure and sport activities is exclusively conducive to well-being (Stenseng, Rise, & Kraft, 2011).

Ego involvement has been defined as an unobservable state of motivation, arousal or interest toward a recreational activity and/or associated product. Additionally, it is evoked by a particular stimulus or situation and has drive properties (Rothschild, 1984). Within the leisure literature, involvement has usually been treated as a multifaceted construct including attraction, sign, centrality to lifestyle, and risk (Havitz & Dimanche, 1997). More recently, Kyle, Absher, Norman, Hammitt, and Jodice (2007) re-conceptualized the concept, by suggesting that leisure involvement contains five facets: attraction to activity, centrality of activity to lifestyle, social bonding, identity affirmation, and identity expression. Attraction refers to the importance individuals ascribe to an activity and the pleasure derived from the activity. Centrality refers to the degree in which an individual organizes other dimensions of their lives around an activity. Social bonding refers to the social ties that bind participants to an activity. Identity affirmation measures the degree to which leisure provided opportunities to affirm the self to the self, and identity expression examines the extent to which leisure provides opportunities to express the self to others. The concept of ego involvement has been extensively explored in the leisure literature. Researchers, for example, have explored the influence of ego involvement in a variety of contexts including consumer behaviour (e.g., Havitz & Dimanche, 1990), event sponsorship (Potwarka, McCarville, Johnson Tew, & Kaczynski, 2009), loyalty and commitment to a recreation agency (Iwasaki & Havitz, 2004), and health-related outcomes (Deci & Ryan, 1995).

We believe obsessive and harmonious passion for an activity may be related to the particular facets of leisure involvement described above. To our knowledge however, the construct of leisure involvement has yet to be explored in such a fashion. Therefore, the purpose of the present study was to explore associations of the five facets of leisure involvement with passion (i.e., obsessive and harmonious) for competitive physical activities at the intramural and intercollegiate sport levels.

Method

The sample consisted of 587 male and female athletes that participated in competitive (i.e., varsity and intramural) team sports at Ontario Universities. Athletic Departments and coaches at four southern Ontario universities were contacted and asked for permission to survey varsity athletes and intramural participants. Once permission was granted, dates and times were arranged with varsity teams and intramural groups to complete the survey. Participants competed in ice hockey, basketball, volleyball, rugby, field hockey, soccer and football. Participants completed the Passion Scale (Vallerand et al., 2003) and the Modified Involvement Scale (MIS: Kyle et al., 2007). The passion scale consists of two subscales to measure obsessive and harmonious passion. Each subscale consisted of six items measured on a 7-point Likert scale, from 1= not agree at all, 7= very strongly agree. An example item of an item to measure obsessive passion was “I have the impression that competitive sports control me.” An example of an item to measure harmonious passion was “Competitive sports allow me to live a variety of experiences.”

The MIS measured five facets of involvement consisting of three items in each (i.e., attraction, centrality, social bonding, identity affirmation, and identity expression). The items were measured on a 7-point Likert scale, from 1= not agree at all, 7= very strongly agree. An item to measure attraction was “Competitive sports are one of the most enjoyable things I do.” An item to measure centrality was “I find a lot of my life is organized around competitive sports.” An item measuring social bonding was “Most of my friends are in some way connected to competitive sports.” An item measuring identity affirmation was “When I participate in competitive sports, I can really be myself.” An item of identity expression was “Participating in competitive sport says a lot about whom I am.”

Results

The sex split for the sample was 64% male and 36% female. The average age of participants was 21 years old. In total, 41% of respondents played competitive intramural sports and 59% played a sport at the varsity level. On average participant’s spent eleven and half years engaging their sport of interest. Overall, participants perceived their sport participation to be more harmonious (M=5.47, SD=.96) rather than obsessive (M=3.83, SD=1.27) in nature.

Two linear regression analyses were performed to explore relationships between leisure involvement facets and obsessive and harmonious passion. All results are presented in Table 1. After controlling for sex, age, and total years playing the sport the five facets of the MIS, the model accounted for 36.5% of the variance (F = 40.88, p b = .33, p b = .18, p b = .11, p

After controlling for sex, age, and total years playing the sport the five facets of the MIS accounted for 47.0% of the variance (F = 62.92, p b = .35, p b = .13, p b = .10, p

Discussion

The findings of this study reveal some interesting insights regarding relationships between ego involvement and passion. Specifically, we found that both identity facets were positively associated with obsessive and harmonious passion. This finding suggests that passion (irrespective of it being obsessive or harmonious) is deeply connected with notions of identity. For example, people who are passionate about playing hockey come to understand themselves in terms of being a “hockey player,” and express the affirmation of being a “hockey player” to others via clothing, behaviours, language, and cognitions. After the addition of each MIS facet, age was negatively associated with obsessive passion, but unrelated to harmonious passion.

Centrality to lifestyle was exclusively associated with obsessive passion. If an activity becomes too central in people’s lives, they run the risk of being controlled by the activity, and perhaps lose connections with other important factors in their lives. Essentially, the activity can take over their life, which has the potential to negatively influence relationships, well-being and life satisfaction (Stenseng & Phelps, 2013). Our finding here is consistent with characteristics of serious leisure explored previously. As Stebbins (2007) noted “serious leisure is always much more complicated and enduring, and for this reason often takes up much more of the participants time and is much more likely to generate charges of selflessness” (p. 74). Attraction, on the other hand, was exclusively associated with harmonious passion. This finding suggests that deriving pleasure and enjoyment from a sport activity is associated with it being a welcomed addition to people’s lives, which effectively (i.e., harmoniously) integrates within other life demands.

 Our paper makes an important theoretical contribution. Specifically, our findings appear to demonstrate convergent validity among these two constructs. These finding have implications for competitive sport coaches and administrators. We suggest programing efforts be built on principles of fun and enjoyment. Losing sight of these principles might create conditions that foster obsessive passion. Moreover, coaches and administrators should be ever mindful of the central role such activities have in lives of athletes. Coaches and administrators should create cultures that allow athletes to engage in social worlds that extend beyond the particular activity. In lieu of our findings, we are critical of the long-term effects of elite sport academies and sport specialization programs targeted to young athletes.

References

Deci, E.L & Ryan, R.M. (1995). Human autonomy: The basis for true self-esteem. In M.H. Kernis (Ed). Efficacy, agency, and self-esteem. Plenum series in social/clinical psychology., (pp. 31-49). New York, NY: Plenum Press, xvi, 257 pp.

Havitz, M.E. & Dimanche, F. (1990). Propositions for guiding the empirical testing of the involvement construct in recreational and tourist contexts. Leisure Sciences, 12, 179-196.

Havitz, M.E. & Dimanche, F. (1997). Leisure involvement revisited: Conceptual conundrums and measurement advances. Journal of Leisure Research, 29, 245-278.

Iwasaki, Y. & Havitz, M.E. (2004). Examining relationships between leisure involvement, psychological commitment, and loyalty to a recreation agency. Journal of Leisure Research, 39, 45-72.

Kyle, G., Absher, J., Norman, W., Hammitt, W., & Jodice, L. (2007). A modified involvement scale. Leisure Studies, 26:4, 399-427.

Potwarka, L.R., McCarville, R.E., Johnson Tew, P., & Kaczynski, A.T. (2009). Sponsorship recognition: Exploring involvement–exposure interaction effects and the influence of multiple mediums. Event Management, 13(4), 233-247.

Rothschild, M.L. (1984). Perspectives on involvement: Current problems and future directions. Advances on Consumer Research, 11, 216-217.

Stebbins, R.A. (2007). Serious Leisure. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers.

Stenseng, F. (2008). The two faces of leisure activity engagement: Harmonious and obsessive passion in relation to intrapersonal conflict and life domain outcomes. Leisure Sciences: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 30:5, 465-481.

Stenseng, F., & Phelps, J. (2013). Leisure and life satisfaction: The role of passion and life domain outcomes. World Leisure Journal, 55:4, 320-332.

Stenseng, F., Rise, J., & Kraft, P. (2011). The dark side of leisure: Obsessive passion and its covariates and outcomes. Leisure Studies, 30:1, 49-62.

Vallerand, R.J. (2010). On passion for life activities: The dualistic model of passion. In M.P. Zanna (Ed.). Advances in experimental social psychology. New York, NY: Academic Press.

Vallerand, R.J., Blanchard, C.M., Mageau, G.A., Koestner, R., Ratelle, C., Leonard, M., Gagne, M., & Marsolais, J. (2003). Les passions de l’ame: On obsessive and harmonious passion. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 85, 756-767.