Understanding sport event volunteers’ continuance intention: An environmental psychology approach

Highlights

•	Work climate positively predicts intrinsic motivation and attitude, and negatively predicts emotional exhaustion.
•	Intrinsic motivation is a positive predictor of attitude and a negative predictor of emotional exhaustion.
•	Emotional exhaustion has a negative influence on attitude.
•	Attitude but not emotional exhaustion has a negative effect on continuance intention.
•	The environmental psychology model is a viable framework to explain sport event volunteers’ behavior.

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate influences of environmental and personal factors on volunteers’ behavioral intention. More specifically, the authors examined the relationships among work climate, intrinsic motivation, attitude, emotional exhaustion, and continuance intention through the lens of environmental psychology model. Survey forms tapping the interested outcomes were collected from 924 volunteers of a national sporting event in China. Results of structural equational modeling supported all hypothesized relationships, except the negative relationship between emotional exhaustion and continuance intention. This study expanded the understanding and application of the environmental psychology model in the context of volunteerism in sport.

Keywords:

• Volunteering
• Organizational climate
• Motivation
• Attitude
• Burnout
• Continuance intention
• Sporting event

Notes

1 The removed two items were detrimental to convergent validity of the emotional exhaustion scale (AVE < .50).