Washington, Nov 17 (IANS) Fear seems to intensify the enjoyment of games and sporting events, says a new study.

Researchers studied fans of two college football teams as they watched the teams' annual game on TV.

They found that fans of the winning team who, at some point during the game, were almost certain their team would lose, ended up thinking the game was the most thrilling and suspenseful.

'You don't want to be in a great mood during the whole game if you really want to enjoy it,' said Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick, study co-author and associate professor of communication at Ohio State University (OSU).

'We found that negative emotions play a key role in how much we enjoy sports,' she added.

Researchers studied 113 college students as they watched the 2006 football game between the Ohio State University Buckeyes and the University of Michigan Wolverines.

Before the game, they completed questionnaires about which team they were rooting for, and how committed they were to their favourite team.

'When people think about entertainment in general, they think it has to be fun and pleasurable. But enjoyment doesn't always mean positive emotions,' said Praboo David, study co-author and associate professor of communication at Ohio State.

'Sometimes enjoyment is derived by having the negative emotion, and then juxtaposing that with the positive emotion,' David added.

In the past, researchers have thought of positive and negative emotions experienced in entertainment as cancelling each other out, David said, according to an OSU release.

But this research suggests that both positive and negative emotions act independently and together to contribute to entertainment and enjoyment.

The study will appear in the December issue of the Journal of Communication.