CB2

1.      Some consumers feel that a sports team is part of the extended self. At www.flameheads.com they celebrate fanaticism toward the Tennessee Titans football team.

How does affiliation with a sports team affect self perception? What other affiliations are part of the extended self?

Why do people become so fanatic about a sports team? They buy the jerseys, pay the money for the tickets, collect, buy and trade sports cards? It can even become a fantasy where fans can pick their own players and create their own teams. The social identity theory, when applied to sports fans, helps to explain their behavior. The social identity theory states that people are motivated to behave in ways that maintain and boost their self esteem.
Having high self esteem is typically a perception of oneself as attractive, competent, likable and morally good person. These attributes make the person more attractive to the outside social world and making it more desirable for others to be in positive relationships with them.
        Without self esteem and the positive aspects that it brings into a person’s life, a person feels alone and this isolation causes deep anxiety. Sports can work to increase self-esteem for a person by association and affiliation. By wearing the teams colors, attending every game, and knowing all the players’ names, positions and stats, a fans begin to feel as if they are an integral part of the team. Therefore, when a team does well, they feel high self esteem in connection with their team’s victory. They connect with the team as if they were playing the game themselves.
Even when a team looses, the social identity theory states that a person will still view the team just as positively because of the threat a defeat has to his or her own self esteem, now that the person has identified with the team. But if the fan is closely linked, the social identity theory further states that an individual will, in the face of defeat, still view their team just as positively.
This phenomena, of viewing a person’s favorite team just as positively after a defeat, is due to the biases and discriminating behaviors a person has against the other teams, and he or she will attribute a loss or defeat to external cues rather than to their own team. A "true" fan will then find reason to explain the team’s loss and place the blame everywhere besides the team itself.
Therefore, I think affiliation to any sports team is a positive thing for having positive self perception and boosting up one’s self- esteem. And by associating oneself with such teams, psychologically it has helped in building good self- perception about oneself.

The extended self means all the products a person buys and at the same time becomes a part of a person’s self. There are four different levels of extended self:

1. Individual (e.g. cars and clothing)
2. Family (e.g. a house and its furnishings)
3. Community (e.g. the neighborhood one lives in)
4. Group (e.g. a sports team one supports or plays in)