THE EFFECT OF SOCIETAL COMMUNICATION ON CUSTOMER BEHAVIOR: EVIDENCE FROM THE ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE

We present a simple model to estimate the effects on behavior of a group of societal campaigns, aimed at fostering racial equality attitudes. The activity of the Kick it Out is confronted with attendance of English Premier League games. The results support the idea that people weight benefits against results in appraising their willingness to adhere to a campaign. When the foreign player of their own team contributes to results, he is appreciated. At parity of results, the fans prefer players of their own nationality. This indicates that although the campaign may have changed attitudes, it has not changed behavior yet.