Evaluating New Zealand sports stars as celebrity endorsers : intriguing results

Celebrity athlete endorsement of products and services has become prominent in the promotional mixes of New Zealand companies and organisations. For years advertisers and researchers have pondered how successful celebrity athlete endorsement really works. Most suggest some form of transfer of positive images takes place between celebrity and the product or service they are endorsing and source-credibility models have become the preferred research design. The overall objective of this research was to assist sport marketing managers and their advertising agencies in matching celebrities with products and services. An ancillary objective was to compare results obtained from multiple-item and single-item scales. An exploratory study with tertiary students was conducted, using both Ohanian’s (1990) 15 item source-credibility scale and two single-item measures to examine potential “endorsement fit” for four New Zealand sporting heroes. They were Bernice Mene (recently retired national netball team captain), Dean Barker (America’s Cup yachting defender’s helmsman), Mandy Smith (recently retired national women’s hockey team star) and Justin Marshall (All Black rugby’s most capped halfback), all of whom were adjudged by students as physically attractive sports stars. The product reported here against which these athletes were scored was an isotonic sports drink. Results were mixed; the Ohanian source-credibility scale yielded selection of different celebrity athletes to the single-item measures. The research results show that matching celebrities to products for potential endorsement opportunities is a complex issue, leaving scope for judgement and intuition alongside quantification. Still unresolved is the question of multiple-item measures versus single-item measures in advertising and service research.

Parental exercise is associated with Australian children's extracurricular sports participation and cardiorespiratory fitness : a cross-sectional study

Background: The relationship between parental physical activity and children's physical activity and cardiorespiratory fitness has not been well studied in the Australian context. Given the increasing focus on physical activity and childhood obesity, it is important to understand correlates of children's physical activity. This study aimed to investigate whether parental exercise was associated with children's extracurricular sports participation and cardiorespiratory fitness.

Methods: The data were drawn from a nationally representative sample (n = 8,484) of 7–15 year old Australian schoolchildren, surveyed as part of the Australian Schools Health and Fitness Survey in 1985. A subset of 5,929 children aged 9–15 years reported their participation in extracurricular
sports and their parents' exercise. Cardiorespiratory fitness was measured using the 1.6 km (1- mile) run/walk and inaddition for children aged 9, 12 or 15 years, using a physical work capacity test (PWC170).

Results: While the magnitude of the differences were small, parental exercise was positively associated with children's extracurricular sports participation (p < 0.001), 1.6 km run/walk time (p < 0.001) and, in girls only, PWC170 (p = 0.013). In most instances, when only one parent was active, the sex of that parent was not an independent predictor of the child's extracurricular sports participation and cardiorespiratory fitness.

Conclusion: Parental exercise may influence their children's participation in extracurricular sports and their cardiorespiratory fitness levels. Understanding the correlates of children's extracurricular sport participation is important for the targeting of health promotion and public health interventions, and may influence children's future health status.