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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Sports Act. Living
Sec. Sports Politics, Policy and Law
Volume 7 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fspor.2025.1541485
This article is part of the Research Topic Sports Policy and Management in the Era of Sustainable Development Goals: Challenges and Opportunities View all 7 articles
Green practices and sustainability as precursors to the intention to participate again in sporting events held in nature
Provisionally accepted- 1 University of Costa Rica, San José, San Jose, Costa Rica
- 2 University of Cádiz, Cádiz, Spain
- 3 Faculty of Sport, Pablo de Olavide University, Sevilla, Spain
In recent years, the need to tackle major environmental challenges has increased awareness among organisations seeking to promote sustainable practices and minimise the impact of their events. This is a challenge for sports organisations and promoters, as they must offer high-quality events that meet the needs of the participants and, at the same time, are environmentally friendly. Objective: to explore the relationship between sustainability, green practices, quality, satisfaction and intentions to participate again in sports events held in nature in Costa Rica. Methodology: 781 participants (66.3% men and 33.7% women), with an average age of 40.9 ± 11.9 years. We used a questionnaire composed of 24 items taken from different validated scales. For the purpose of data analysis, we applied various statistical techniques, including the calculation of descriptive statistics, Cronbach's alpha index, the average variance extracted, composite reliability and structural equation models. Results: sustainability is an important determining factor of event quality. We also found that green practices positively influence event quality. In addition, the emotions experienced by the participants have a significant impact on event quality, as well as on their intentions to participate again in the future. Conclusions: the implementation of green and sustainable practices is fundamental in the management of sporting events held in natural spaces, since they not only contribute to reducing environmental impact, but can also improve the quality of the event. In turn, these variables, along with the positive emotions experienced during the event, influence the participants' intentions to participate again on future occasions.
Keywords: sustainability, Green practices, quality, Satisfaction, Emotions, Future intentions
Received: 07 Dec 2024; Accepted: 19 Feb 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Chaves-Castro, Morán-Gámez, Nuviala and Fernández-Martínez. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Antonio Fernández-Martínez, Faculty of Sport, Pablo de Olavide University, Sevilla, Spain
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