FiT Publishing

Screen golf, a virtual sport utilizing interactive simulators, has seen enormous growth in the Republic of Korea. This virtual sport removes some of the constraints consumers experience, keeping them away from playing golf at an outdoor course (e.g., cost and weather). This study explored how leisure constraints differ between screen golf and outdoor golf and identified differences in leisure constraints among diverse types of consumers. Based on a sample of 389 South Korean consumers, results indicated significant differences in leisure constraints between outdoor and virtual golf in cost...Read more

This paper examines tests for hot- and cold-hand effects in men’s professional golf, based on score relative to par over sets of 3, 6, 9, and 18 holes. Using controls for each player’s annual performance and the difficulty of a set of holes on a given day, I find no evidence for a hot-hand effect. In contrast, I find evidence supporting the existence of a cold-hand effect—that is, a poor performance on one set of holes leads to a worse performance on the next set of holes. Simulations demonstrate that the cold-hand effect is quite large.Read more

There have been a host of empirical papers studying the returns to skill in professional golf (e.g., Alexander & Kern, 2005; Callan & Thomas, 2007; Moy & Liaw, 1998; Rishe, 2001; Shmanske, 1992, 2000, 2008). None of these studies, however, carefully considers the skewed distribution of earnings in professional golf. This paper uses quantile regression to better handle the skewness and outlier values found in PGA earnings data. Using data from the PGA for the years 2004 to 2007 results of quantile regressions show that the returns to skills—such as putting and driving accuracy—...Read more

Between January 2001 and November 2009, players of Asian descent won nearly 30% of the 287 LPGA-sanctioned tournaments held during the period. By contrast, only 15 years ago (in 1995), an Asian player won only one of the 37 LPGA tournaments held that year (Ladies Professional Golf Association [LPGA], 2009). Clearly, a new generation of golfers has significantly increased the ethnic diversity of the LPGA and its tournament winners. This study investigated whether and how ethnic diversity in the LPGA has influenced the objectives and strategies of LPGA sponsorship decisions for the Anheuser-...Read more