What is "home field", "home court", "home ice", "home stadium" advantage?

[gregmav1]

What makes a team play better at home? what are the factors that help out the most? Because without a doubt a team wins on average more at home than on the road. Why exactly is that?

Crowd momentum? Familiarity with the stadium/how it looks? Being able to sleep at home?

What makes home field advantage, home field advantage? Does it differ on the sport? I would think it does.

[Deuce]

No travel. Travel will bury anyone.

[pavyracer]

Fans.

[GunShard]

"Whoever is first in the field and awaits the coming of the enemy, will be fresh for the fight;
whoever is second in the field and has to hasten to battle will arrive exhausted."
-Sun Tzu, the Art of War

[jjgold]

Fans
No travel
Know the environment of very well meaning stadium, arena, field

[yisman]

Sports Illustrated published a study on this a few years ago.

Players don't perform better at home (best expressed with free throw shooting, which remains the same on average).

What changes are the officials. The officials are affected by the fans and favor the home team.

http://www.bowdoindailysun.com/2011/01/hey-ref-are-you-blind-home-field-advantage-explained-sports-law-blog/

[steady hustlin]

What he said. In game referee psychology is insane. Impossible to be human and be 100% unbiased. David Hume proved this long ago.

[70kgman]

Home teams get last change in NHL, get to see who the other team puts on the ice before they choose their line. A legit home ice strategical advantage.

[Big Bear]

a big part of sports is being in the right mental state of mind.

Imagine being a visiting QB in Death Valley or in a place like century Link in Seattle....

pretty tough to think straight in that type of enviorment.

in MLB the starting pitchers are more comfortable pitching on their home mounds bc they are more familar with those mounds.

in basketball shooters like to shoot from a certain spot on the court...

in College football many of the visiting locker rooms are the size of middle school PE locker rooms.

At Iowa University they painted the visiting locker room pink so that the visiting team would feel homosexual when taking the group shower after the game. Also pink has been shown to make you less agressive.