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Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services Vol 3, No 2, pp.

91-98, 1996

Pergamon 0969-6989(96)00073-9

Copyright 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd Printed in Great Britain. All rights reserved 0969-6989/96 $15.00 + 0.00

Review
Research on service quality evaluation: evolution and methodological issues
Joz e Lapierre
Ecole Polytechnique de Montreal, 2900, boul. Edouard-Montpetit, CP 6079, Succursale Centre-ville, Montrdal, Qudbec, Canada H3C 2A7

Pierre Filiatrault and Jean Perrien


Universit~ du Quebec ?z Montreal, CP 8888, Succursale Centre-ville, Montreal, Quebec, Canada H3C 4R2

Service quality, and more specifically the evaluation of that quality, has given birth to an increasing body of knowledge for both professional and standard services. What is the state of the art of research in this growing disciplinary field? The authors present a synthesis of the evolution of empirical work on service quality, emphasizing the most important phases that have influenced the process followed by researchers. A methodological analysis of empirical work on the evaluation of the quality of professional and standard services to individuals and organizations is conducted. The results reveal that two schools of thought, the Nordic and the American, have given rise to a considerable body of literature. The former tends to be more theoretical and the latter more empirical. In addition, the research objectives and the quality of research also vary in depth. The methodological issues related to the definition of services and to the conceptualization and measurement of service quality are discussed.
Keywords: service, quality, research, evolution

Research on the delivery and marketing of services has been concerned with quality for more than a decade (Gr0nroos, 1984; Parasuraman et al, 1985). The importance of service quality is due to its ability to distinguish highly successful firms from those that are merely average (Schmalensee et al, 1985). This article focuses on the evaluation of services quality research. A n extensive investigation of the research strategies and methodological issues of evaluating service quality is carried out, as the interest of both practitioners and academicians for service quality evaluation has materialized in a plethora of research and publications. A n analytical framework is developed to track the methodological evolution of this important domain of research.

The general objective of this paper is thus to investigate both the research process in service quality evaluation and related methodological issues. The specific objective is to gain a better understanding of the research strategies used in this particular type of research in order to help both academicians and managers to better measure service quality with the goal of improving customer satisfaction and relations.

A n overview of research on service quality


An extensive review of the literature allowed us to identify the research work related to the evaluation of both professional and standard services quality. Table 1 presents a set of authors classified in accordance with

the main parameters taken into account in the research on the evaluation of service quality dimensions and service dimensions. Service quality research is first divided according to the technical and the functional quality dimensions proposed by Gr6nroos (1984), and the service quality dimensions emphasized by Parasuraman et al (1985, 1986, 1988, 1991) - 22 and 25 studies respectively. A professional service is defined as an art or a performance offered by a qualified experienced individual (normally a university graduate) accountable to a third party (such as the Association of Consulting Engineers) which has a code of ethics, and is consequently subject to highquality control levels. A standard service is any other tertiary activity. It 91

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Table 1 Summary of studies on service quality Technical and functional dimensions


Lovelock and Young (1979) Czepiel (1980) Booms and Nyquist (1981) Gummesson (1981) Quelch and Ash (1981) Zeithaml (1981) Lewis and Booms (1983) S**i S**i S/PS**i PS**ii PS*i S/PS**i S**i

Service dimensions
Sarkar and Saleh (1974) Albert and Pearson (1983) Hull and Burns (1984) Cravens et al (1985) Jackson et al (1985) PS*i PS**i PS**ii PS*ii PS*i S*i S**i S**i PS*i S*i PS*i PS*i/ii S*ii PS*i S/PS*i PS*i S*i PS*i/ii S*i S*i S*i S*i PS*ii PS*ii S*i

Parasuraman et al (1985, 1986, 1988, 1991)


Knoll and Hoffman (1986) Andrews et al (1987) Baumgarten and Hensel (1987) Lindquist (1987) Little and Myers (1987) Day et al (1988) Teas (1988) Hedvall and Paltschik (1989) Carman (1988, 1990) Bojanic (1991) Bolton and Drew (1991a, 1991b) Consulting Engineers Ass. (1991) Nha (1991) Babakus and Boiler (1992) Cronin and Taylor (1992) Boulding et al (1993) Freeman and Dart (1993) Lapierre (1993) Teas (1993)

Gr~nroos (1984)
Becker (1985) Watson (1986) Crosby and Stephens (1987) Grtinroos (1987) Judd (1987) Kelley (1987) King (1987) Wheatley (1987) Lindqvist (1987) Edvardsson (1988) Teas (1988) Lehtinen and Lehtinen (1991) Nha (1991) Lapierre (1993)

S/PS*i
PS**i PS**ii S*i S**i S**ii S**i S**i PS**ii S*i PS*ii S*ii S*i S*i PS*ii

Note: S = standard services; PS = professional services; * = empirical studies; ** = theoretical studies; i = individuals;

ii = organizations.

is a temporal experience, an art or a performance in which propriety cannot be transferred; it is intangible; it can be people or equipment based, however, it usually calls for a customer-contact personnel interaction and sometimes for customer participation. By a theoretical emphasis, we mean that the emphasis was on developing purportedly theoretical constructs, which could be empirically tested. The purpose of the research was more to increase understanding by relating sets of statements. On the other hand, an empirical emphasis means that the research is mainly guided by observation, surveys and experiments to develop knowledge. Researchers have used either the experimental, theoretical or empirical paths (Brinberg and Hirschman, 1986) to achieve their objectives, with the substantive domain being services marketing. Finally, the unit of analysis can be either individual or organizational customers. Organizational customers are characterized as those in the 92

industrial, commercial or governmental markets. T a b l e 1 also specifies: the type of service - whether professional services (20 studies), standard services (23 studies), or both (4 studies; the nature of the inquiry - either empirical (30 studies) or theoretical (17 studies); the unit of analysis - individual (33 studies), organizational customers (12 studies), or both (2 studies).

Kerlinger (1986). Also included in the analysis are the type of evidence (Morgan and Smircich, 1980), the type of service, the number and type of analysis units, the response rate, the publication,1 the main objectives and the main results. Consequently, the analysis executed takes into account the following research dimensions: research strategy - laboratory experiments, field experiments or field studies; data collection method - personal and telephone interviews, focus groups, postal questionnaires, observation;

Owing to the objectives set forth in this paper, our focus will be on the empirical studies specifically related to the evaluation of service quality.

Methodological analysis of empirical work


The methodological analysis concentrates heavily on the frameworks proposed by Churchill (1987) and

JPublications were selected in the following way. A search identifying the keywords 'service quality' and 'professional service quality' was carried out using the Proquest database. The authors also identified a number of proceedings pertaining to conferences on services. Only articles from which it has been possible to extract the identified parameters were used in this research.

Research on service quality evaluation


type of evidence - qualitative or quantitative; type of service - standard service or professional service; number and type of units of analysis - individuals, households or industrial customers; response rate; publication Journal of Marketing, A M A Proceedings, etc; main objective(s); main results. this research was exploratory in nature, even if it consisted of replicating the Parasuraman et al (1985, 1986) research. The data collection methods are very diverse, Nine researchers used self-administered questionnaires, while six conducted interviews: other researchers relied on a combination of methods (in-depth interviews and questionnaires, in-depth interviews, focus groups and questionnaires, and in one case an experiment and a postal survey with questionnaires). Evidence was thus both qualitative and quantitative, in accordance with the data collection methods used by researchers. The complementary nature of the approaches to conducting service quality research is evident and shows the preoccupation with external validity in many of the investigations. similar in nature. Fifteen studies were conducted among individual customers, four among organizational customers, and two studies used both types of customers.

N u m b e r and type o f units o f analysis, and response rate


Quantitative research, which uses the technical and functional quality framework, generally requires relatively large samples: on the other hand, qualitative research is characterized by relatively small samples, which sometimes leads to case studies (eg Lehtinen and Lehtinen, 1991). With respect to the units of analysis, they are numerous. Individual customers as a unit of analysis concentrated on adult customers and households. Among organizations, the units of analysis are executives and managers. In one case, both the employees of the organization and individual customers were surveyed. The response rate in all the studies is considered relatively high (ie greater than 40%). With regards to the research framework by Parasuraman et al (1985, 1986), studies using qualitative data have less information on the samples, while the number of sampled units related to quantitative data varies between 80 and 1000, depending on the study. In the research pertaining to organizational markets, the unit of analysis varies greatly (ie executives, commercial developers, owners, managers, project managers). The response rate, when specified, varies between 21% and 52%. Generally, research conducted among organizational customers has a higher response rate than research conducted among individual customers.

The objective of the methodological analysis is to gain a better understanding of the research accomplished on the evaluation of service quality. This framework presents most of the inputs required to portray the methodology of the research on service quality evaluation.

Research strategy, data collection methods and type o f evidence


The large amount of research on service quality listed in Table 1 demonstrates a high level of interest for this subject. Although the majority of studies investigated were empirical in nature, the studies using the GrOnroos framework (technical and functional quality dimensions) were more often theoretical (13 out of 22). More empirical work has been accomplished using the Parasuraman et al (1985, 1986, 1988, 1991) framework (21 out of 25). The data collection methods for the nine empirical studies using the technical and functional dimensions of service quality were:

Type o f service
Research using the technical and functional quality framework (GrOnroos, 1984) has been conducted both on professional services (3) and on standard services (5), with one research study dealing with both types of services. The standard services studies are considered to be similar in nature. One of the studies conducted on professional services used a large, diversified sample of industries, while the other two were more industryspecific. Of these studies, three were conducted among organizational customers and six were conducted among individual customers. This classification was at times difficult to construct, owing to the failure of certain authors to differentiate clearly the types of services (standard or professional) or the units of analysis (organizational or individual customers). Research originating from the Parasuraman et al (1985, 1986) framework has also been conducted on both types of services (professional services, 11: standard services, 9: both, 1). The research conducted on professional services has mostly been conducted on a specific service (12/12L whereas research on standard services has very often comprised more than one service (8/10): some of the services are often considered

field studies, when questionnaires were used (4): in-depth interviews (3): questionnaires and personal interviews (2).

Publications
The only conclusion that can be drawn from the research on technical and functional quality is that the empirical work appeared in a great variety of publications: for example, American Marketing Association Proceedings, Journal of Professional

The data collection method used influenced the type of evidence gathered. Three studies contained solely quantitative data, three contained both qualitative and quantitative data, and three contained only qualitative data. Most researchers (21 out of 25) who used the Parasuraman et al (1985, 1986) framework conducted field studies. During the 1980s, much of

Services Marketing, Journal of Marketing, Services lndustrv Journal


and doctoral dissertations. No trends were identified. 93

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On the other hand, however, it is possible to track the evolution of publications on empirical work drawing from the Parasuraman et al (1985, 1986, 1988, 1991) model. The starting point for this phenomenon began with the work of Parasuraman et al (1985), with their first model published in the Journal o f Marketing. During the late 1980s, several authors replicated their model by employing the Servqual measurement instrument. The work of these authors first appeared in various proceedings of the American, European and French Marketing Associations. Subsequently, the research was published in a number of journals, such as the Journal of Professional Services Marketing, the Journal o f Retailing and Recherche et Applications en Marketing. A t times, these publications depended on the type of service discussed, the origin of the authors and the population studied.
M a i n o b j e c t i v e s o f research o n service quality

A review of the literature (Fisk et al, 1993; Lapierre, 1993) reveals that two schools of thought, the Nordic and the American (Gr6nroos, 1984; Parasuraman et al, 1985, 1986, 1988, 1991) have given rise to a considerable body of knowledge on this topic. The main objectives of these schools of thought were to first clarify the definition of the quality construct in services marketing and then conceptualize it. Parasuraman et al proceeded even further by actually developing a measurement instrument. Generally, it was found that researchers who drew heavily on Gr6nroos' work tested the importance of the two generic dimensions (ie the technical and functional dimensions of quality). Some authors have compared their results to the results of both schools of thought (Lindqvist, 1987; Hedvall and Paltschik, 1989), or have used both schools of thought (Lapierre, 1993). The main objective of the first researchers who drew on the work of Parasuraman et al (1985, 1986) was to replicate the Servqual scale proposed by these authors in different professional and standard services contexts. 94

The nature of these studies was specifically at the substantive domain level (Brinberg and McGrath, 1985). More recently, some authors have started to examine and criticize a number of issues surrounding service quality evaluation, including conceptual and methodological domains (Brinberg and McGrath, 1985). The objective of some authors was to test the value of operationalizing service quality in terms of expectations and perceptions: for example, evaluating the gap model in comparison with other frameworks (Babakus and Boiler, 1992; Cronin and Taylor, 1992; Boulding et al, 1993; Lapierre, 1993; Teas, 1993). Some authors have also questioned the stability of the dimensions of Servqual as well as the mix of positive and negative statements (Carman, 1988, 1990; Lapierre, 1993). In addition, some researchers have started to integrate the service quality research with attitude, value, satisfaction, behavioural intention and monetary price research (Gorn et al, 1990; Bolton and Drew, 1991a, 1991b; Cronin and Taylor, 1992; Boulding et al, 1993; Lapierre, 1993). These latter studies have given rise to a more complex and richer research in terms of statistical analyses and methodological aspects.
M a i n results

The works of Gr6nroos and Parasuraman et al have stimulated two streams of research and have subsequently resulted in an increase in the body of knowledge on services quality. The research results drawing on both the technical and functional quality approaches show that, given the nature of services (intangibility, simultaneity and heterogeneity), functional quality is quite important, and may in some instances be more important than technical quality and price (Gr6nroos, 1984). Furthermore, these two generic dimensions can be applied to both the customers' and the providers' points of view. Research that focuses on service quality dimensions has received a lot of attention. Researchers who replicated Servqual have shown the unstable characteristics of the dimensions, whether it be five or ten. In fact, the

structure of the dimensions of the Parasuraman et al model (1985, 1986, 1988) are rarely identical (eg Cravens et al, 1985; Carman, 1988, 1990; Day et al, 1988; Hedvall and Paltschik, 1989). This obviously had an influence on the results of a second wave of research on service quality and service value, which has shown the preeminence of service quality in the evaluation of service value. Some researchers have also shed some light on the contribution of costs in the evaluation of service quality (Jackson et al, 1985; Lindqvist, 1987; Teas, 1988; Freeman and Dart, 1993; Lapierre, 1993). The most recent studies, which are more complex, have examined and criticized the methodological and conceptual domains of service quality research. Parasuraman et al (1991) have been critical with regards to their own measurement instrument. Additional researchers (Carman, 1988, 1990; Babakus and Boller, 1992; Teas, 1993) have carefully examined Servqual and are of opinion that there exist a number of flaws related to the conceptualization and operationalization of service quality. Consequently, Teas (1993) has developed and empirically tested alternative perceived quality models that address the problems of the traditional framework. One of his models is an evaluation performance model (EP). His examination of the performance minus expectations (P - E) service quality model indicates a number of problems, particularly with respect to the conceptual and operational definitions of the expectations (E) and the revised expectations (E*) components of the model. Teas (1993) suggests that a considerable portion of the variance in the Servqual expectations measures may be caused by respondents' misinterpretations of the questions rather than by different attitudes or perceptions. The next section presents a discussion on the methodological issues discovered in the empirical studies related to service quality, and identifies some causes of these methodological issues.

Research on service quality evaluation

Methodological issues
Issues related to the definition o f services
Several authors fail to make a distinction between professional services and standard services. Some mix both types without any mention of the fact, while others have even confused the two (Quelch and Asch, 1981). The aforementioned could be a source of errors, because both professional services and standard services marketing each have their own emerging concepts, paradigms and bodies of knowledge.

Issues related to the conceptualization and m e a s u r e m e n t o f service quality


The first difficulty arises with the question of what to measure (ie expectations alone, the type of expectations, performance alone, or both expectations and performance). Some authors question the gap analysis model, as more and more studies rely only on the perceptions of the performance of services. Whereas Cronin and Taylor (1992) have, among other things, used the Servqual 22 performance statements, Liljander and Strandvik (1992), without knowledge of the other researchers' work, approached the problem from a different point of view using the confirmation/disconfirmation paradigm. In fact, both groups of researchers used a similar argument and reached the same conclusion: the performance-based measure (experiences) is a good enough method for obtaining valid results, and may well be an improved means of measuring the service quality construct. Boulding et al (1993) showed that the current perception of service quality (following the encounter or service contact) is a function of two types of expectations (what will occur and what should occur) as opposed to Servqual (only what should occur) during the service encounter. The two types of expectations could have opposite effects on perceptions. Their results are incompatible with the onedimensional view of expectations and the gap formulation for service quality, for they find that service

quality is directly influenced only by perceptions. Bolton and Drew (1991a) used only the perception ratings of the service quality dimensions, with their statements relying heavily on reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy. Two major differences can be found in comparison with Servqual. The statements were specific to the telecommunications industry rather than being general, and expectations were not measured with regard to service quality dimensions. Furthermore, they used direct measures of disconfirmation (ie discrepancies between anticipated and perceived performance levels). For Gr(inroos (1993), the gap analysis model is identical to the disconfirmation paradigm, whereas for Bolton and Drew (1991a) the two are completely different. Moreover, Teas (1993) explained that the Bolton and Drew model (1991a) explicitly assumes that the disconfirmed expectations concepts specified by Parasuraman et al (1985, 1986, 1988, 1991) are identical, which is incongruent with the Parasuraman et al (1988) definitional framework, which differentiates the performance-expectation service gap from the concept of disconfirmed expectations specified in the consumer satisfaction model. Criticizing the confirmation/disconfirmation paradigm, Gr6nroos (1992a), states that: If expectations are measured after the service experience or simultaneously while the experience is occurring, it is not the expectations that are being measured, but something that has been biased by the experience and is therefore different from the model. Expectation measurement conducted prior to the service experience is not favoured either: a customer's expectations prior to the experience are perhaps different from those with which they are compared. If a customer's perception of actual quality is to be determined, the customer's experience during the service encounter may form the expectations and change the experience that should be measured.

Measuring expectations may be an inefficient way of proceeding. owing to the experience being a perception of reality; inherent in this perception are the customer's prior expectations. The second difficulty arises in identifying whose service quality perceptions should be measured: the individual delivering the service, the personnel involved, the organization, or a combination. The Servqual instrument fails to make any distinction between the service organization, its personnel and the individual who delivers the service. The third difficulty arises in connection with the service itself: Should the emphasis be on measuring the quality of the encounter (the how: functional quality) or on the quality of the basic service (the what: technical quality) as well as with the former or both? Once again, Gr6nroos (1984, 1987, 1992a, 1993) helps in showing that a customer's perception of quality is related not only to the output of the service, but also to the delivery process itself. The customer's own experience with the process - the extent of involvement - also has an impact on the perceived quality of the service. The fourth difficulty deals with service dimensions: Should they be generic, specific or a mix of both? Most researchers have used generic dimensions (Parasuraman et al, 1985, 1986, 1988. 199l): however, some others have criticized this approach (Carman, 1990: Babakus and Boiler, 1992: Lapierre, 1993). Lindqvist (1987) even built his own service quality and value scale by using both generic and specific attributes. A review of the literature has revealed the most common generic instrument for measuring service quality to be Servqual, albeit it is not considered a uniform instrument. Some researchers use the original one with 34 statements (Boulding et al, 1993: Lapierre, 1993): others use a version that contains 26 statements, and still others use several versions that contain only 22 statements. In addition, evidence shows that some researchers still use other scales and compare their results with one of the Servqual versions. 95

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One of the main conclusions that can be drawn from the literature is that Servqual is an appropriate starting point rather than an end in itself; however, it must not pretend to be generic in character (Andrews et al, 1987; Carman, 1988, 1990; Hedvall and Paltschik, 1989). It requires customization to be truly representative of the specifics of the services/professional services or industry studied. Generic dimensions allow comparisons, and specific dimensions allow differentiation. Even though they should not, the aforementioned critics do have some influence on the published results. For instance, the number of factorial solutions varies between 1 and 10 in the research published. Thus the validity of the research published to date on service quality may be questionable. In addition, the quality of this research also varies depending on the type of journals or proceedings.

(3)

(4)

should the emphasis be on the functional quality, the technical quality or both; should the service dimensions be generic, specific or both?

According to Gr~nroos (1993): The perceived service quality model, and other static service quality models, such as the gap analysis model, are still valid as static models. A n d as such they are important. These models are the result of the first phase of service quality research, where the most important task was to develop an understanding of what service quality was and which variables and contexts were important in the quality perception of customers and in managing service quality. However, when models are developed for measuring service quality, serious problems arise. As services are processes, and thus dynamic phenomena, any attempt to develop a measurement model based on a static model has its limitations. The most widely known measurement model today, Servqual, and other similar methods of measuring service quality that have been developed in the second phase of service quality research, are derived from the static perceived service quality model. Servqual has had a tremendous impact on creating an interest in measuring service quality in a systematic way, and has probably advanced the research into service quality more than anything else during the late 1980s and early 1990s. It has also inspired researchers to question some of the fundamental aspects of the perceived service quality model as well as Servqual itself, which are based on the notions that the perception of quality is a result of a comparison between expectations and experience. The confirmation/disconfirmation concept in a static model holds true, although service quality can be described based on other approaches as well. As researchers do not seem to understand well enough how expectations develop and how in fact experiences are compared with expectations in a dynamic fashion, all models of

Conclusion
In this article, we have provided an overview of some of the studies completed on service quality. Service quality research was analysed with respect to the technical and functional dimensions and the service dimensions as well as with regard to the type of service, the nature of the inquiry and the unit of analysis. On the whole, an approximately equal number of studies were carried out on both professional services and standard services, with two-thirds focusing on individual or organizational customers. The research objectives were to test the importance of the two generic dimensions of the Gr6nroos model or to replicate Servqual. Additional studies have examined and criticized a number of issues on the evaluation of service quality. Methodological issues related to the definition of services and the conceptualization and measurement of service quality were discussed. Four difficulties were reviewed: (1) (2) what to measure; whose service quality perceptions should be measured:

how to measure dynamic processes, such as services, based on a static foundation will at some point run into a dead end (GrOnroos, 1993). Service quality research is now clearly heading into a third phase. What is needed now is a dynamic version of the perceived service quality model, which recognizes the nature of the services. Perceived service quality, and the changes in that perception, should be measured as a continuous function throughout the service encounter. However, as long as there are no acceptable dynamic models of service quality, we have effectively to use static models. Grt~nroos (1992a) believes a good idea would be to change the expectations component to something that improves the validity of quality measurements. He suggests concentrating on developing measurement models based solely on customer experiences of quality. In the third phase, the interest of researchers is predominantly driven by a search for better and more realistic measurement models. In short, the pioneering work carried out in the first phase of service quality research aimed at understanding what quality was and in which context quality perception was formed. After the development of measurement models in the second phase, which are consequently based on the static models of the first phase, research is now in its third phase, where it is attempting to create refined measurement devices and develop a deeper understanding of the process of service quality perception. The work of Boulding et al (1993) and Bolton and Drew (1991b) are examples of this kind of research. Specifically, Boulding et al (1993) have created a dynamic version of the static gap model: that is the model was tested on some repeated-measures lab data and on some cross-sectional industry data. Their research is a fine beginning of a dynamic research process (Iacobucci et al,1994). There is little longitudinal research, however. This article gave an overview of research on service quality focusing on the evaluation of quality. Two schools of thought, the Nordic and the American, have influenced

96

Research on service quality evaluation theoretical and empirical research on service quality. The conceptual work of G r 6 n r o o s and Parasuraman et a/were seminal. It is hoped that this article will help both academicians and practitioners alike to develop more efficient and valid measures of service quality by addressing the issues reviewed and eventually bridging the gap between these two schools of thought. Furthermore, all this body of research is silent with regard to two critical issues that would merit m o r e attention. The impact of price on service quality and the role of image in the evaluation of service quality have not been addressed here. Authors are conscious that this research has some limits, one of which is its descriptive nature. A l t h o u g h this research is descriptive, it has shed light on the development of the concept of quality and on the evolution of research on this concept. A replication of such a study pertaining to the research work on service quality that has been carried out after 1993 would certainly be of a very different nature. Research on service quality is continually evolving, and it would thus be interesting to push this type of analysis further. Bolton, R N and Drew, J H (1991a) "A multistage model of customers' assessments of service quality and value' Journal of Consumer Research 17 (March) 375-384 Bolton, R N and Drew, J H (1991b) 'A longitudinal analysis of the impact of service changes on customer attitudes' Journal of Marketing 55 (January) 1-9 Booms, B H and Nyquist, J L (1981) 'Analyzing the customer/firm communication component of the services marketing mix' in Donnelly, J and George, W (eds) Marketing of Services AMA, Chicago, pp 172-177 Boulding, W, Kalra, A, Staelin, R and Zeithaml, V A (1993) 'Dynamic process of service quality: from expectations to behavioral intentions' Journal of Marketing Research XX! (February) 7-27 Brinberg, D and Hirschman, E (1986) 'Multiple orientations for the conduct of marketing research: an analysis of the academic/practitioner distinction' Journal of Marketing 50 (October) 161-173 Brinberg, D and McGrath J E (1985) Validity and the Research Process. Sage, CA Carman, J M (1988) "The dimensions and measurement of service quality: an assessment of the Servqual dimensions" Marketing de services, XVe SOminaire international de recherche en marketing La Londe les Maures, 84-98 Carman, J M (1990) 'Consumer perceptions of service quality: an assessment of the SERVQUAL dimensions" Journal of Retailing 66 (1) 33-55 Churchill, G A Jr (1987) Marketing Research 4th edn, Dryden Press, New York Cravens, D W, Dielman, T E and Harrington, C G (1985) 'Using buyers' perceptions of service quality to guide strategy development' in Lisch, R F, Ford, G T, Frazier, G L, Howell, R D, lngene, C A, Reillay, M and Stampfl, R W (eds) AMA Educators' Proceedings, AMA, Chicago pp 297-30l Cronin, J J and Taylor, S A (1992) 'Measuring service quality: a reexamination and extension' Journal of Marketing 56 (July) 55-68 Crosby, L A and Stephens, N (1987) 'Effects of relationship on satisfaction, retention, and prices in the life insurance industry' Journal of Marketing Research XXIV (November) 404-411 Czepiel, J A (1980) Managing Customer Satisfaction in Consumer Service Businesses Marketing Science Institute, Cambridge, MA Day, E, Denton, L L and Hickner, J A (1988) 'Clients' selection and retention criteria: some marketing implications for the small CPA firms' Journal of Professional Services Marketing 3/4 283-295 Edvardsson, B (1988) 'Service quality in customer relationships: a study of critical incidents in mechanical engineering companies' Services Industries Journal 8 (4) 427-445 Fisk, R P, Brown, S W and Bitner, M J (1993) 'Tracking the evolution of the services marketing literature' Journal of Retailing 69 (1) (Spring) 61-103 Freeman, K D and Dart, J (1993) 'Measuring the perceived quality of professional business services' Journal of Professional Services Marketing 9 (1) 27-48 Gorn, G J, Tse, D K and Weinberg, C B (1990) 'The impact of free and exaggerated prices on perceived quality of services' Marketing Letters 2 (2) 99-110 Gr6nroos, C (1984) "A service quality model and its marketing implications' European Journal of Marketing 18 (4) 36-44 GrOnroos, C (1987) 'Developing the service offering - a source of competitive advantage' in Surprenant, C Add Value To Your Service AMA, Chicago, pp 81-85 Gr0nroos, C (1992) ~How quality came and where it is going" in Scheuing, E and Christopher, W (eds) Handbook of Service Quality AMACOM, New York GrOnroos, C (1993) 'Towards a third phase in service quality research, challenges and future directions" in Swartz, T A, Bowen, D E and Brown, S W (eds) Advances in Services Marketing and Management 2 JAI Press, pp 49~54 Gummesson, E (1981b) 'The marketing of professional services: 25 propositions' in Donnelly, J and George, W (eds) Marketing of Services AMA, pp 108-112 Hedvalk M B and Paltschik, M (1989) 'An investigation in and generation of service quality concepts' in Avlonitis. G J, Papavasiliou, N K and Kouremenos. A G (eds) Marketing Thought and Practice in the 1990s 1 European Marketing Academy, Greece, pp 373-483 Hull, J and Burns. R G (1984) qs NRC's QA program working'?' Quality Progress (January) 29-33 Iacobucci, D, Grayson, KA and Ostrom, A L (1994) 'The calculus of service quality and customer satisfaction: theoretical and empirical differentiation and integration' in Swartz, T A, Bowen, D E and Brown, S W (eds) Advances in Services Marketing and Management 3 JAI Press, pp 1-67 Jackson. D W, Brown. S W and Keith, J E (1985) 'Business executives, evaluations of various aspects of outside legal services" in Bloch, T M, Upah, G D and Zeithaml, V A (eds) Services Marketing in a Changing Environment AMA, Chicago, pp 130-134 Judd, V C (1987) "Differentiate with the 5th P: people" Industrial Marketing Management 16 (4) 241-247 Kelley, S W (1987) "Managing service quality: the organizational socialization of the service employee and customer" UMI Dissertation Information Service, University of Kentucky, 221 pp 97

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