In 2016, several prominent athletes kneeled or sat during the national anthem of their games to protest social injustice in America . For their activism, these athletes inconsistently experienced both positive and negative consequences from their sponsors and fans . Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate this phenomenon more closely by examining the effect of activism type and activism effort on a sponsor’s brand image and purchase intention of a product the athlete endorses, when controlling for brand familiarity . Participants (N = 384) were randomly assigned into groups in a 2 (activism type: safe, risky) x 2 (activism effort: low, high) experimental study . Results indicated brand image and purchase intention were negatively impacted by risky activism compared to safe activism, but activism effort had no effect on the two variables . Further implications and future research are expanded upon in the discussion .

中文翻译：

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活动家类型和对品牌形象及购买意图的努力的实验研究

2016年，几位杰出的运动员在比赛的国歌中跪下或坐着，抗议美国的社会不公。由于他们的积极性，这些运动员从赞助商和球迷那里经历了积极和消极的后果。因此，本研究的目的是在控制品牌熟悉度时，通过检验激进类型和激进努力对赞助商品牌形象和运动员认可的产品的购买意图的影响，来更深入地研究这种现象。参加者（N = 384）随机分为2组（行动类型：安全，危险）x 2（行动强度：低，高）实验研究。结果表明，与安全行动相比，风险行动对品牌形象和购买意愿有负面影响，但是积极的努力对这两个变量没有影响。讨论中进一步扩展了影响和未来的研究范围。