Date of Publication

Fall 12-2014

Document Type

Undergraduate Project

Professor's Name

Dr. Burakowski

Abstract

Abstract

Fans use of social media to follow athletes is becoming more and more popular these days and fans often use this as a way to attempt to get recruits to attend schools that they themselves are a fan of. The reasoning behind the research is that not a lot has been done on this topic and with social media becoming more and more popular looking into the fans usage of social media towards recruits is worth looking into. The fact that professional leagues and the NCAA have attempted to implement and enforce a policy against the illegal tweeting practices going on in sports attest to the need for further research, even though the NCAA especially has found it very difficult to enforce such policy.

Looking into the top 100 athletes Twitter accounts of the 2015 class showed a good idea of fans investment in these recruits decision, with an overwhelming majority tweeting about how amazing the athlete is and how they should come to their school. These findings are important because it is showing that fans are using Twitter as a positive way to reach out to athletes and want to be involved in the process. Another reason that the research findings are important is because the NCAA and other leagues could potentially look to adjust their policy so that the fan and athlete can still maintain that positive connection, and potentially only penalizing negative tweets towards the athlete or school.

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