Dynamic pricing has become one of the most popular pricing strategies of developed online shopping environments and provides efficiency for both providers and consumers in the service industry. Spectator sport providers have recently adopted dynamic ticket pricing (DTP), which is a type of dynamic pricing and discriminated prices, as a result of DTP, may lead to perceptions of unfairness, especially during the early stages of its adoption. The aim of the current research was to develop a conceptual framework based on relevant consumer psychology theories, including distributive and procedural justice, equity, and social comparison theories, in order to empirically investigate the formation and influence of perceptions of price fairness. Four categories of questions corresponding to a given scenario were employed via a questionnaire to collect data: predictors of price fairness, perceptions of price fairness, behavioral intentions, and demographic sections. Participants who define themselves as current or potential sports consumers were selected using a convenient sampling method in a face-to-face mode. After verifying the items using exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), and structural equation modeling (SEM) was performed to examine: (1) the influence of predictors of price fairness (i.e., magnitude and temporal proximity price difference, perceived nonmonetary sacrifice, and price setter fairness) on perceptions of price fairness; (2) differences in degrees of influence on perceptions of price fairness between the two groups of price fairness predictors (i.e., similar other-reference and self-reference group) depending on comparison targets; and (3) the influence of perceptions of price fairness on behavioral intentions. Using SEM the hypotheses were tested. First, magnitude of price difference was strongly and negatively associated with perception of price fairness, while temporal proximity positively influence the fairness perception. Also, price setter fairness was positively consistent with perception of price fairness. Furthermore, it was found that created perception of price fairness was negatively correlated with self-protection and revenge intentions, although the fairness perception positively effects repurchase intentions. The current research was expected to contribute to the soft landing of DTP in the spectator sport industry by providing critical information of factors determining price fairness judgment, and the effects of perceptions of price fairness on behavioral intentions for better understanding of DTP for both researchers and practitioners.
