Modeling Contextually Elicited Service Quality Expectations

Research on service quality has taken a prominent role in services marketing over the last three and a half decades. From the ground breaking work of early researchers (Grnroos 1978, 1984; Lehtinen and Lehtinen 1982; Parasuraman et al., 1985), attention to the issues of measuring, modeling, and managing service quality has grown exponentially (see Rust and Oliver 1994). Of vital importance is the issue of defining and measuring the concept of service quality, since doing so accurately determines both its theoretical and practical use. Two decades ago, controversy erupted as to how service quality should be measured (Cronin and Taylor 1992, 1994; Parasuraman et al., 1991; Parasuraman et al., 1988, 1994). Part of this controversy revolved around the validity and reliability of SERVQUAL (Parasuraman et al., 1985) and the service dimensions which best predict consumers' overall preferences and perceptions of service quality.