Longitudinal impacts of a recurring sport event on local residents with different level of event involvement

Many of the studies that examined the impacts of major sport events have been cross-sectional and focused on one-off mega events such as World Cup and Olympics. In addition, athletes participating in those events usually are of elite level, and community members from the host city rarely have a chance to be involved as participants. While local residents in the host city could be involved in an event with various roles (ex., participants, spectators and non-participants), they could, thus, have different degrees of association with the event. Such differences could be reflected in many areas, such as knowledge of the event, attention level, or perception of the event. Thus, this study aims to investigate such differences in the setting of a recurring, mass participatory sport event (Standard Charter Hong Kong Marathon, SCHKM), and further examines the changes in residents’ perceptions overtime utilizing data collected before (n = 944), during (n = 884) and after (n = 838) the event from Hong Kong residents. Findings indicate that residents’ level of involvement is a significant determinant of both positive and negative impact perceptions and those impact perceptions are likely to change over time. Residents who participated in the marathon reported a significantly higher positive impact perceptions and significantly lower negative impact perceptions compared to spectators and other residents. Negative impact perceptions reported were significantly higher during the event compared to negative impact perception reported before or after the event. Theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.