What is the intention of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to start the YOG? How does the IOC position the YOG differently than the regular Summer and Winter Gam

7-1 Short Paper: Youth Olympic Games Awareness

Intention:

The intention of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to start the Youth Olympic

Games (YOG) was to attract the younger audience during a generation that the article states are a

generation of increasingly overweight and inactive adolescents. This was due to a decline in

viewership by the younger audience over the years and the fear that this decline in views

amongst the 18 to 49 age group would affect the brand of the Olympics. Gilert Felli who is the

Executive Director for the IOC’s Olympic games states that some schools have got rid of sports

from their school and physical education class because they feel it doesn’t provide much value to

the importance of sports or a healthy lifestyle.

Positions:

The IOC positions the YOG differently than the summer and winter games by only

focusing on the youth and helping reduce child obesity and increasing their participation in

sports. In addition to helping the younger generation increase their participation in sports the

IOC hope this will also help attract more adolescence to the Olympics and decrease the age in

their audience. The main target age for the YOG is 14 to 18 years old, which is the most

important age to change an adolescent mind to something because of how easily influenced they

are at that age. The creation of the YOG has also allowed the IOC to expand into different host

sites and hold benefits for the summer and winter Youth Olympic Games.

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Emerging Issues:

The emerging the IOC must address for the future as it relates to the YOG is the

awareness of the event through SNS and the media. The use of SNS allows the sports audience

different ways of communicating and interacting with the numerous sport events and being able

to report faster with texting. This tool also allows people to connect with their friends and share

information to each other. The media is important to the IOC because they are used to promote

and adverting the YOG to a large audience, which would be difficult if the IOC had to do this

themselves while still struggling to reach their targeted younger audience. My strategy to solve

this problem would be to use the SNS more to promote the YOG since in 2014 the data showed

during the YOG in Najing, China where the awareness and the interest in attending the event

were linked to the use of both the SNS and the media.

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References

Judge, L. W., Lee, D., Surber, K., Bellar, D., Petersen, J., Ivan, E., & Jung Kim, H. (2013). The

Promotion and Perception of the Youth Olympic Games: A Korean Perspective. Journal

of Research, 8(2), 12-18. Retrieved February 10, 2019, from

https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1034017.pdf.

Li, M., MacIntosh, E. W., & Bravo, G. A. (n.d.). Chapter 13 International Youth, School, and

Collehiate Sport. In International Sport Management (pp. 283-297).

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12 Journal of Research

by Lawrence W. Judge, Ball State University; Don Lee, Ball State University; Karin Surber, Cisco Systems, Indianapolis; David Bellar, University of Louisiana Lafayette; Jeffrey Petersen, Baylor University; Emese Ivan, St. Johns University & Hyeon Jung Kim Ball State University

Abstract The Youth Olympic Games (YOG) was launched in part to

reignite interest in Olympic sports in the midst of a generation of increasingly overweight and inactive adolescents. But since the initial announcement of the YOG by the International Olympic Committee in 2007, this new third addition to the Olympic family of events has provoked response from loyal advocates and equally committed critics. The purpose of this research study was to assess how attitudes, public awareness, and access to social media impact the sports community in Korea regarding YOG engagement via television viewing or event attendance. The regression results revealed that familiarity with the YOG, public awareness and use of media for sports information were statistically significant contributors for Koreanʼ’s intention to watch televised Youth Olympic Games. In contrast, social network service (SNS) accessibility, familiarity with YOG and public awareness significantly affected Koreanʼ’s intention to attend the YOG. These findings are described and evaluated in order to provide further insight during the ongoing development of this relatively new international sport festival and mega-event.

Key words: Awareness, Competition, Fair Play, Sportsmanship

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) seeks to reignite interest in Olympic sports amongst a generation of adolescents that are becoming increasingly overweight and inactive. The IOCʼ’s Executive Director of the Olympic Games, Gilbert Felli, stated that some schools even withdraw sports and physical education programs from the curriculum to cut costs because they place a minimal value on the significance of sport and its impact on healthy lifestyles (IOC, 2007). In order to address both marketing and health related issues, the IOC announced inauguration of the Youth Olympic Games (YOG) targeting young athletes aged from 14 to 18 (IOC, 2007). The first Summer YOG was held in Singapore in 2010. The president of IOC, Jacques Rogue, indicated that a primary objective was to reduce childhood obesity and increase participation in sport activities among youth population. Despite good intentions, since the announcement of the YOG, this new proposal has provoked mixed responses from both loyal advocates as well as equally committed critics. Critics have expressed concerns such as overtraining, risk of injuries, and psychological pressure among these adolescent competitors (Brennan, 2007).

The general purpose of the YOG has been shown to be multi- faceted. The first facet is to create opportunities for young athletes to compete at international levels of sporting events and with a related facet of fostering communication with related communities

about their positive experiences with the YOG event. In addition, educational programs are expected to be initiated from this type of event, such as a Cultural and Educational Program (CEP), and the Competitive Program (CP), which is a type of contest for mixed-gender and mixed-National Olympic Committee (NOCs) teams (Torres, 2010). Another purpose includes allowing for an expansion of the host sites and host benefits for Olympic related events through the Summer and Winter YOG. Before and after the inauguration of the YOG, Singapore experienced many changes in economic, political, and social development. Likewise, international sporting events such as Olympics, Paralympics, and FIFA World Cup have been recognized as a booster for sports marketers as well as tourism developers (Goh & Tong, 2010). To maximize the potential benefits of this type of marquee event, the Singapore government and Youth Olympic Games organizing committee created marketing avenues for domestic businesses in association with the YOG. Plans are moving forward to develop the Youth Olympic park and provide additional monetary support for education (Goh & Tong, 2010).

Korea has also experienced similar benefits from hosting marquee sporting events including the Seoul summer Olympics of 1988 and the 2002 FIFA Korea-Japan World Cup (Jung, Chow, & Woo, 2003). Extensive research was conducted in Korea to estimate the effectiveness of marquee sporting events, and results indicated that Koreaʼ’s economy has escalated and many positive political and financial benefits have occurred as a result of hosting these events (Song, 2003). Song (2003) further noted that many aspects of Koreaʼ’s economy have improved including the infrastructure, tourist industry, sport leisure, electronics and telecommunications, and trade businesses. Enhancement of the countryʼ’s image across the globe was an additional benefit (Olaf & Jung, 2001). The Olympics were also used as a means to encourage diplomatic endeavors, which is consistent with one of the IOCʼ’s mission (Lee, B, 2012).

Through these sport events (Olympics and World Cup), youth sports get attention from government, sports organizations, and schools (Lee, 2011). However, as IOC President Rogge mentioned, problems still exist within todayʼ’s youth population such as increasing rates of childhood obesity, the need to participate in more sports activities among the youth population and the need to build a strong sense of ethics in youth sports (IOC, 2007). As such, another YOG facet of purpose relates to improving youth fitness and combating obesity. Park, 2002, noted that although the physique index has increased within children and adolescents, they often do not have healthy body conditions because of unbalanced eating habits, overindulgence in carbohydrates and lipids, and a lack of physical activity due to sedentary life styles. An additional problem was recognized in physical activity patterns among the Korean youth population in that the general student population could not get adequate opportunities to engage in sport activities because the focus on sport activity in Korea is heavily weighted

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volume 8, issue 2 13

Awareness of the Youth Olympic Games

on elite sports. Another reason is that Korean students commonly do not have sufficient time to complete regular exercise because of their extremely competitive education system. By the same token, after-school programs do not include exercise programs and most of the students go to private educational institutes or have private tutors after school to maintain high academic standards. For these reasons, the students often are not as physically fit which results in unbalanced lifestyles (Cho, 2009).

With increasing public awareness, the Ministry of Education and Human Resources Development planned to develop more sport clubs to improve these social issues (Huh, Kim, & Jung, 2007). The sport clubs are divided into three types; Korean sport club, youth sport club, and school sport club. The Korean sport club, organized by the Ministry of Culture, Sport, and Tourism, is a pilot project focusing on local sport clubs. Since 2004, numerous demonstration projects were initiated to create more opportunities for sports participation among youth and discover athletic talent among youth populations. The school sport club, supervised by the Ministry of Education and Human Resources Development, is a part of an after-school program emphasizing an equal value of studying and exercising across the youth population (Huh et al., 2007). The aim of the school sport club was to offer chances to engage in sport activity, develop sport skills, interest, good sportsmanship, and promote healthy lifestyles among the youth population (Huh et al., 2007). In addition to the healthy lifestyle changes, Bredemeire, Weiss, Shields, and Shewchuk (1986) demonstrated that children who learn fair play, sportsmanship, and ethical development via sport and physical education settings tend to develop more mature and positive personality traits.

The media has also played important roles in promoting and changing the publicʼ’s perception on youth healthy lifestyles in Korea. The previous two marquee sporting events, especially the 2002 FIFA Korea-Japan World Cup, were prioritized by the media (Jung et al., 2003). All media including television, internet, advertisement, and radio were focused on soccer and broadcasted some matches several times (Jung et al., 2003). For example, Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation (MBC; one of the largest Korean TV broadcasting companies) initiated the Youth Football Foundation immediately after the event to promote and support youth soccer leagues (Choi, 2009; Ji-eun, 2006). According to Lee (2005), print media and electronic media have converged through computers and the internet because they contain both audio and video contents that are available on an unlimited basis online. In Korea, the rate of internet usage has dramatically increased under a government policy designed to build a more progressive information society (Kim, 2004). According to the Korea Network Information Center (2003), 59.4% of Koreans over age six use the internet, with 65.2% of users being male and 53.6% being female. With the evolution of a high-speed communication network, social network service (SNS) technology has appeared and changed social relationships between people (Lee, J, 2012). Through SNS, people foster relationships with others, have opportunities to make new personal connections (Bae, 2005), and get sport information in real time and learn sport rules (Lee, J, 2012).

The initial hosting of the YOG were made by Singapore (summer 2010) and Innsbruck (winter 2012). A very low general interest in and awareness of the YOG was demonstrated amongst various

audiences including US sport coaches and administrators (Judge, Petersen, & Lydum, 2009), Greek athletes and coaches (Judge et al., 2011), and a sample of US figure skating coaches (Judge et al., 2012). As the YOG are still in their infancy, the eventʼ’s future is unclear. In many respects, the situation would be akin to asking, in the early 1900s, whether the Modern Olympic Games would survive. Given the significant potential implications of the YOG on both the youth and the international sport communities, the goal of this investigation was to further explore the YOGʼ’s sustainability potential (taken here as survival and success). The purpose of this study was to assess how attitudes, public awareness, and access to social media impacted the South Korean sports communityʼ’s awareness of the 2012 Winter Youth Olympic Games. This study sought to determine the effect of the key variables on Koreansʼ’ consumption of televised YOG and intention to attend the then upcoming YOG.

Methods A survey methodology was employed in order to assess the

awareness of and interest in the upcoming Winter YOG. The participants were surveyed approximately one month prior to the closing of the 2012 Winter YOG to assess the eventʼ’s global marketing efforts. The survey was modified from the original instrument with minor changes to the demographic elements and the addition of scaled questions related to intention to attend or view future YOG events along with six scaled questions related to media consumption. Additional demographic data was collected in the present study to measure the social networking habits and behaviors of the subjects including an indication of social networking sites used (i.e. Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter). The original survey instrument was composed of six demographic elements and five research-related questions, and was modeled upon a previously developed and tested instrument (Judge et al., 2009). In order to verify both content and face validity, the instrument was reviewed by a panel of four experts in the area of youth sport. Two of the panelists were practitioners in the field of youth sport and two of panelists were academicians with research expertise in youth sport. The demographic survey components included: gender, coaching experience, sport administration/management experience, and athletic background. A seven-point Likert-scale method was used for ranking the seven dependent variables of the study which included: perceived personal awareness of the YOG, perceived public awareness of the YOG, intention of YOG event attendance, and intention to view the YOG on television. The first two primary research questions explored event awareness of the YOG by addressing two separate perceptions: individual and public awareness. The first question asked participants to assess their own level of familiarity with the YOG and the second asked participants to evaluate perceived public awareness of the YOG. The next two questions assessed intent to engage in the games via attendance or television viewing. Additional scaled questions related to media consumption addressed the aspects of the subjectsʼ’ accessibility to social networking sites, perceptions of social media advertisement influence, use of traditional newspapers and magazines, use of traditional TV and radio, use of the internet or World Wide Web, and use of traditional communication to gain information. Both the survey and the research protocol were reviewed and approved by

14 Journal of Research

the appropriate university Institutional Review Board (IRB). The English version of the questionnaire was then translated to

Korean by one of the primary authors who is a native Korean with bilingual skills, qualifications which include holding a doctorate from a US institution, and expertise in the area of sport studies. The translated version of the questionnaire was then electronically sent to a faculty member and researcher in Korea. Data were collected from multiple classes throughout the campus in a single university in Korea. Participants in this study numbered 250 individuals (22.3yrs ± 2.21) with a gender mix of 43.2% female and 56.8 % male.

To analyze the data, descriptive statistics were calculated for the overall variables using PASW 18.0 version. Then, correlations among the overall variables were obtained. Two multiple regression analyses were conducted to examine the extent to which the six independent factors (familiarity with Youth Olympic Games, general public awareness, accessibility to social networking/media sites, exposure to advertisements on social media sites, perceived importance of traditional media such as newspapers and magazines, perceived importance of traditional media to sports, and use of the internet) influenced two dependent variables (the intention to watch Youth Olympic Games on television and the intention to attend Youth Olympic Games). To minimize type I error, when multiple regression analyses are conducted, the alpha level was adjusted from .05 to .025 (Hair, Black, Babin, & Anderson, 2010).

Results Descriptive Results

The majority of respondents indicated that they had either no coaching experience (77.2%) or youth coaching experience (20.8%). The majority of respondents had leadership backgrounds as follows: no leadership experience (89.6%), local sport official/ referee (4.0%) or administrator at provincial level (2.8%). Eighty percent of the participants had no formal athletic background while nearly 17% were athletes at the high school level. Approximately 65% of the participants were actively connected with some type of social network. The most frequently visited social networking sites were Facebook (57.2%), followed by Twitter (5.2%). A little over 8% of the participants indicated “other”. Their primary use of social networking media was to keep in touch with friends (77.8%), to look up high school or college alumni (11.1%), to search sports information (11.1%), to keep in touch with family members (6.7%), to use as education materials (4.4%), and for professional networking (4.4%). A summary of the descriptive statistics for the overall variables is provided in Table 1.

Multiple Regression Results To examine the influence of six independent variables on the

intention to watch televised YOG, a multiple regression analysis was conducted. The overall results revealed that the combined set of independent variables collectively explained approximately 22% of the variance in watching YOG on television. At the univariate level, Familiarity with YOG, Public awareness and Use of media for sports information were statistically significant contributors (p = .008, .018, and .023, respectively) to the relationship between the independent factors and the intention to watch YOG on television. The beta coefficients were all positive indicating a positive

influence of the selected independent variables on the dependent variable. Table 2 provides a summary of these regression analyses results.

To achieve the second objective (i.e., predicting factors that impact the intention to attend Youth Olympic Games), a separate multiple regression analysis was conducted. The overall results indicated that the combined set of independent variables collectively explained approximately 25% of the variance in intention to attend upcoming Youth Olympic Games. At the univariate level, in contrast to the initial regression, SNS accessibility was newly discovered as a statistically significant factor (p = .009) in addition to both Familiarity with YOG (p = .004) and Public awareness (p = .004). The beta coefficients were all positive indicating a positive relationship between selected independent variables and the dependent variable. A summary of this second regression analysis is provided in Table 3.

Awareness of the Youth Olympic Games

Mean Std. Deviation

PersonalFamIOC 1.2196 .68064 PubAwIOC 1.4907 .89201 SocNetAccess 6.2523 1.24164 AdInfluence 3.3178 1.67050 TradNewsMag 4.7290 1.58378 TradTVRadio 5.7336 1.46927 WWWUtil 5.8925 1.33309 TradComm 4.9346 1.57009 WatchYOGtv 3.4206 1.91136 AttendYOG 2.5888 1.49461

Table 1. Descriptive Statistics

Independent Variables Beta t P

YOGFamiliar .194 2.658 .008* YOGPublicAware .176 2.384 .018* SNSAccess .037 .529 .598 MediaImportance .007 .083 .934 MediaSport .192 2.294 .023* Internet .063 .893 .373

Note. R square: 21.6%. Alpha was adjusted from .05 to .025.

Table 2. Multiple Regression Analysis on Intention to Watch Televised YOG

Independent Variables Beta t P

YOGFamiliar .205 2.871 .004* YOGPublicAware .209 2.892 .004* SNSAccess .183 2.627 .009* MediaImportance .003 .042 .967 MediaSport .159 1.933 .054 Internet -.055 -.785 .433

Note. R square: 24.7%. Alpha was adjusted from .05 to .025.

Table 3. Multiple Regression Analysis on Intention to Attend YOG

volume 8, issue 2 15

political player in the eyes of the international community. An example of this could be Pyeongchang, Korea, which will host the 2018 Winter Olympics. The Koreans wish to draw interest to their country and boost interest in winter sports among their people. Another goal for South Korea in hosting the games is to increase tourism during the winter along with connecting with people in a new market. After the marquee sports events (Seoul summer Olympics of 1988 and 2002 FIFA Korea-Japan World Cup), Korea had changed perceptions about the importance of participating in sports. After the Seoul Olympics, the government attempted to increase athletic facilities and encouraged increased participation in sports (Park & Yu, 2011). Public awareness of sport has increased as a result of an attempt to control health issues including reducing disease and stress, and improving physical fitness. An increase in participation in sports was reflected in different ways among the population depending on personal preference and economic status (Jung, 1997). Additionally, by attending sport events (watching television and attending sport games), people could indirectly experience sports. Hamʼ’s (2009) research showed that the attention of the WBC (World Baseball Classic in 2009) and figure skating has escalated interests in leisure sports even more. The author mentioned that the increased attention paid to sport was related to increased exposure to sport media such as newspaper, television, and the internet. Through social media, people communicate and share opinions with other people, and gather information related to sport.

Personal Awareness Personal awareness was related to intention to attend the

YOG games and watch the games on television. The low level of awareness and perceived awareness in the present study may be reflective of the respondentsʼ’ knowledge and awareness of youth sport. This finding is consistent with the previous studies. For example, Lim (2004) indicated that spectatorsʼ’ knowledge such as game rules and terminologies, athletesʼ’ performance, club marketing strategies, and team power tends to increase interest in sports. Lim (2004) further found that peoplesʼ’ interest in sports could depend on their family and social culture. Yeo (2004) explored the intention of attending baseball game events and found that interest in the baseball game was related to adjunct events such as cheerleading and raffle prizes. Nearly 80 percent of the participants answered that along with watching the baseball game, provision of adjunct events further interested them in joining in the game. This finding highlights the ʻ‘sportainmentʼ’ aspect of athletic events. Other studies explained that the intention to watch the games on television was associated with personal awareness. Kim and Lee (2003) identified the determinants of sports viewing behavior and found that awareness of sport rules and knowledge, positive behavior, and familiarity with a team were related to watching the games on television. Building personal awareness of the YOG is the first step to increased interest in the event, ultimately driving financial outcomes. The metrics used to measure the effectiveness of the brand awareness efforts indicated the goals and objectives of the YOG, one of which was to avoid over commercialism and create a different type of event, may have been met. In his description of the future YOG Jacques Rogge says, “that compared with other events, the Youth Games will have a strong emphasis on education

Awareness of the Youth Olympic Games

Discussion This study investigated the role of the South Koreansʼ’ level of

public awareness, access to SNS and the media on their intention to watch and attend the YOG. The following results warrant more attention from professionals in the fields of physical education and sport management. It was found that the overall rate of Koreanʼ’s public awareness on the YOG was very low on the 7-point Likert scale for both personal awareness (M = 1.22) and for perceived public awareness (M = 1.49). This result was somewhat expected in that Judge, Petersen, and Lydum (2009) explained the low level of public awareness was related to a lack of publicity in the U.S. because the YOG was only announced recently and participants consisted of varying demographic backgrounds. Judge et al. (2011) indicated that Greek public awareness was also low due to the same reasons.

One of the research questions explored in the current study was related to participantsʼ’ intention to either watch or attend the YOG. The participantsʼ’ intentions were analyzed via the independent variables as follows: familiarity with Youth Olympic Games, general public awareness, accessibility to social networking/ media sites, exposure to advertisements on social media sites, perceived importance of traditional media such as newspapers and magazines, perceived importance of traditional media to sports, and use of the internet. The regression analyses revealed that the intention to watch the games on television was significantly affected by familiarity with YOG, public awareness, and use of media for sports information, while the intention to attend the games as spectators was significantly affected by familiarity with YOG, public awareness, and SNS accessibility. Awareness is the initial stage, which can vary from a simple set of consumer stages (i.e. awareness, consideration, intention, purchase) to a considerably more robust purchase conduit with meticulous stages (Barry, 1987). Sport marketers cannot shape perceptions, drive engagement, or motivate sales without first establishing an awareness of their b

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