Service Quality Measurement: Issues and Perspectives
:
Lewlyn L. R. Rodrigues
:
Service Quality Measurement: Issues and Perspectives
:
Anchor Academic Publishing
:
9783954895526
:
1
:
CHF 31.10
:
:
Werbung, Marketing
:
English
:
81
:
kein Kopierschutz/DRM
:
PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
:
PDF
This book is very useful for it is not just 'descriptive' in its nature, but 'prescriptive', too. It is descriptive in the sense that it describes the process of developing or using a metric in a problem situation, and prescriptive as it clearly prescribes how a beginner can put the theory into practice. In this globalized economy, maintaining quality of products and services has been the thrust area of interest among academicians and practitioners. Today, there are quite a good number of books and research articles available. Nevertheless, service quality measurement has always posed problems, particularly in the context of service industries due to the difficulty in the measurement of the intangibles and implied needs of the customers. The research literature is filled with articles on how to quantify the services, and there are several streams of arguments on the choice of the most ideal approach. However, the research gap lies in the answer to the question: 'Do these measurement instruments concur in their measurement outcomes or do they give different results in the same situation?' This book primarily makes an attempt to answer this question through a case study approach. Even though, there are several instruments for the measurement of service quality, the two most widely used instruments are SERVQUAL and SERVPERF metrics. Comprehensively, this book explains the systematic procedure of using both, the instruments in a service sector, and further, the procedure for conducting a statistical analysis so that one will be able to apply the same in any service sector. It then takes the reader through a series of tests in order to compare the two metrics, and to prove statistically if there is the same outcome in a problem situation. The results are sure to surprise the reader, and trigger the 'research bent of mind' to undertake a similar study of such metrics and gain mastery over performing an independent research with very minimal guidance from a professional guide. To conclude, this book is sure to provide adequate inputs for a service quality researcher, and answer various questions wriggling in the mind of a beginner of service quality research such as: How shall I start with service quality measurement? How to collect data? How to select a sample? How to conduct a literature review? How to analyse the data? What research methodology is applicable? How to build hypothesis on my research? How to use statistical procedures? How to present the [...]
Lewlyn L.R. Rodrigues has 27 years' experience in teaching, research, and administration in several countries. He has successfully guided two students for their Ph.D., and is currently having ten Ph.D. students working under his supervision at Manipal Uni
Text sample: Chapter 2.3, Discussion on Service Quality Models: Adoption of a particular Service quality model into a situation is to a great extent subjective as each of the above models given in the preceding sections defines service quality in its own set of parameters. Zhao et al., (2002) state that Service quality is difficult to measure objectively, since services have been described as intangible, heterogeneous and inseparable. So, a group of researchers started working on the comparison of the results obtained by these models. Based on the results they obtained, researchers also started identifying new dimensions, which were not accounted for in a particular model. So, there has been a wealth of knowledge based on the research of service quality literature. Churchill and Suprenant (1982) established the fact that Service quality was an attitude. Gronroos (1982) brought out another model by emphasizing the significance of processes and outcomes in defining Service quality. In this Nordic model, Gronroos proposed the concept of Expected service and Perceived service as a measure of service quality. Holbrook and Corfman (1985) expanded on the concept of an act being performed and defined perceived quality as a global value judgment and they indicated that quality does by its nature seem to express general approval. They brought out three specific dimensions of quality viz., implicit features, humanistic features, and operational features in nature. Further, Maynes (1985) quantified service quality by placing a number on the level of satisfaction. The literature review on Service quality indicates that SERVQUAL metric dominates the literature and is most widely used (Lai et al., 2007), and has been widely tested for its validity and reliability (Babakus and Boller, 1992; Bolton and Drew, 1991; Brown and Swartz, 1989; Carman, 1990; Cronin and Taylor, 1992, 1994). Although some of these studies failed to support the five dimensional factor structure, Parasuraman et al. (1994) defended the framework on conceptual and practical grounds. Further, Researchers have criticized the SERVQUAL scale for its use of gap scores, measurement of expectations, positively and negatively worded items, the generalizability of its dimensions, and the defining of a baseline standard for good quality (Cronin and Taylor, 1992; Brown et al., 1993; Oliver, 1993). Cronin and Taylor (1992, 1994) suggested that service quality be measured using a performance-only index (SERVPERF) instead of the gap-based SERVQUAL scale. They reported that the use of the SERVPERF scale containing only performance items explained more of the variation in service quality than did the entire 44-item SERVQUAL instrument. The SERVPERF instrument contained 21 of the original SERVQUAL performance items. Cronin and Taylor (1992) argued that SERVQUAL confounds satisfaction and attitude. They stated that service quality can be conceptualized as'similar to an attitude', and can be operationalized by the'adequacy-importance' model. In particular, they maintained that'performance' instead of'performance - expectation' determines service quality and that developed an alternative measurement tool, SERVPERF, which concerns only performance. In their empirical study, SERVQUAL appeared to have a good fit in only two of the four industries examined, whereas SERVPERF had an excellent fit in all four industries. A similar result was obtained from regression analyses. Cronin and Taylor (1994) argue that SERVQUAL: 1. does not measure either Customer satisfaction or Service quality instead it'appears at best an operationalization of only one of the many forms of expectancy disconfirmation'. 2. does not exhibit construct validity. 3. does not ensure that the dependant measure is performance based. 4. has little empirical and conceptual research support. On the above grounds they opine that SERVPERF can provide reliable, valid and useful tool for measuring overall service quality levels or attitudes. A group of researchers including Churchill et al. (1993), Carman (1990), Babacus ad Boller (1992) support this argument. Hence, in consideration of the above discussions it can be very clearly concluded that both of these two instruments (SERVQUAL and SERVPERF) are is use across service quality literature and their relative importance is an issue of analysis.
Service Quality Measurement: Issues and Perspectives
1
Acknowledgement
3
Synopsis
4
Introduction
4
Problem Statement
4
Research Methodology
5
Significance of this Research
5
Limitations and Scope for future Research
5
Conclusions
6
List of Figures
7
Contents
9
1. Introduction
13
1.1. The Background
13
1.2. The SERVQUAL Metric
14
1.3. The SERVPERF Metric
15
1.4. Criticisms on SERVQUAL and SERVPERF
15
1.5. The Problem Statement
16
1.6. Objectives of the research
17
1.7. Significance of this Research
17
2. Literature Review
18
2.1. Service Quality Research
18
2.2. The Service Quality Models
21
2.2.1. Gronroos' Service Quality Model
22
2.2.2. SERVQUAL Model
22
2.2.3. The SERVPERF Model
23
2.2.4. The Three-Component Model
24
2.2.5. The Multilevel Model
24
2.3. Discussion on Service Quality Models
25
2.4. Metric Development
27
3. Structural Models, Hypothesis
27
28
27
3.1. Structural Model: Difference in SERVQUAL and SERVPERF based measurement of Service quality
28
3.2. Research Hypothesis
28
3.3. Metric Preparation
30
4. Researvh Methodology
32
4.1 Nature of Research and the Variables
32
4.2 Research Framework
33
4.4 Development of SERVQUAL/SERVPERF Metric
38
4.5 Organizational Profile and Demographics
38
4.6 Reliability, Validity and Practicality
39
4.6.1 Reliability of the Instrument
39
4.6.2 Validity of the Instrument
40
4.7 Practicality of the Instrument
42
4.8 Data Collection Strategies
43
4.9 Statistical Procedures
45
4.10 Types of Data Analysis
45
5. Analysis and Results
46
5.1.Descriptive Statistics
46
5.2.Reliability analysis
46
5.3.Distribution Pattern
46
5.4.Factor Analysis
47
5.5.Comparisons of SERVQUAL and SERVPERF
48
5.5.1. Department-wise Comparison
49
5.5.1.1.Electronics Engineering Department
49
5.5.1.2.Computer Science
49
52
49
5.5.1.3.Mechanical Engineering Department
56
5.5.2. Institution-wise Comparison
60
5.5.3. Dimension-wise Comparison
63
6. Findings, Implications
63
65
63
6.1. Findings
65
6.2. Implications
66
6.3. Scope for future work
68
6.4. Conclusions
68
References
71
Appendix I
76
Appendix - II
77
Appendix - III
80
