The Role of Perceived Impacts towards Hosting the Volleyball Men's Nations League on Residents’ Support Pre and Post the Events with the Mediating Effect of Social Capital

Holding sports events can have positive and negative effects on the lives of the residents in the host city, both in the short term and in the long run. The purpose of this study was to investigate the residents' support for hosting the World Men's Volleyball League pre- and post-event with the mediating role of social capital. The statistical population of this study included the residents of the two host cities, Ardabil and Urmia.  1556 samples (pre-event: 778 & post-event: 778) were randomly collected. The research instrument consisted of a questionnaire with 48 items involving the study’s main variables: perceived impacts, social capital and residents’ support. IBM SPSS (Statistics 23) was used for statistical descriptions, and Partial Least Square (Smart-PLS 3.2.8) path modeling to event analysis the hypothesized research model. The path coefficient from perceived impacts to social capital were significant (pre-event: R2 = 0.268 & Q2 = 0.130; post-event: R2 = 0.422 & Q2=0.263). We also found the mediating effect of social capital on the supports (pre-event: R2 = 0.163 & Q2 = 0.128; post-event: R2 = 0.542 & Q2 =0.504). Therefore, social capital as a mediator offers an understanding of the relationship between the six categories of perceived impacts and residents’ support. Based on the research findings, before bidding for an important sporting event, it is better to plan to strengthen the positive perceived impacts mainly the socio-cultural impacts and weaken the negative perceived impacts, especially, economic impacts in order to gain residents’ support.