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Abstract

The purpose of this article is to present a review of the literature related to the study of service quality. This article reviews the discussions of the conceptualization and operationalization aspects of consumers' perceptions of service quality. It reviews several models used in the past by researchers as well as more recent approaches that have been utilized to better understand the constructs of service and service quality and the different concepts used to measure them.

Introduction
Quality of service has been studied in the area of business management for years because the market is more competitive and marketing management has transferred its focus from internal performance such as production to external interests such as satisfaction and customers' perception of service quality (Gronroos, 1992). However, the concept of service quality has only recently gained attention in the sport and recreational literature over the last two decades (Yong, 2000). SERVQUAL, which applies the traditional disconfirmatory model, was the first effort to operationalize service quality. Although it made great contribution to the field of service quality and was very popular among service quality researchers in many areas, it is insufficient because of its conceptual weaknesses caused by the disconfirmatory paradigm, and its empirical inappropriateness. Later service quality models with more dimensions were applied. Most recent models such as Brady's (1997) hierarchical multidimensional model synthesized prior approaches and represented the complexity of the construct of service quality perception. Although numerous efforts have been made in both business management and sport/fitness fields, the study of service quality is still at a state of confusion because of the complexity of the construct. No consensus has been made upon the conceptualization or operationalization of service quality perceptions of consumers.

Perception of Service Quality
Service quality has been studied for a long time in the field of business management. However, no consensus has been reached among researchers on how to conceptualize or operationalize the construct. The following section offers a review of the literature regarding service quality. First, focuses on the definitions and characteristics of service and service quality. Then the major approaches to conceptualize and operationalize service quality are reviewed. It is noted that the recent hierarchical multidimensional model is the most comprehensive and best represents the complexity of the construct of service quality perception.

Service and Service Quality

The concept of service comes from business literature. Many scholars offered various definitions of service. For example, Ramaswamy (1996) described service as "the business transactions that take place between a donor (service provider) and receiver (customer) in order to produce an outcome that satisfies the customer"(p.3). Zeithaml & Bitner (1996) defined service as "deeds, processes, and performances"(p.5). Gronroos (1990) pointed out that

A service is an activity or series of activities of more or less intangible nature that normally, but not necessarily, take place in interactions between the customer and service employees and /or systems of the service provider, which are provided as solutions to customer problems (p.27).

Some researchers view service from the perspective of a system-thinking paradigm:

A production system where various inputs are processed, transformed and value added to produce some outputs which have utility to the service seekers, not merely in an economic sense butfrom supporting the life of the human system in general, even may be for the sake of pleasure (Lakhe and Mohanty, 1995, p.140).

Yong (2000) reviewed these definitions of service and pointed out that the following features of service are noteworthy in order to better understand the concept. First, service is a performance. It happens through the interaction between consumers and service providers (Deighton, 1992; Gronroos, 1990; Ramaswamy, 1996; Sasser, Olsen, & Wyckoff, 1978; Zeithaml & Bitner, 1996). Second, other factors such as physical resources or environments play an important medium role in the process of service production and consumption (American Marketing Association, 1960; Collier, 1994; Gronnroos, 1990). Third, service is needed by consumers to provide certain functions such as problem-solving (Gronroos, 1990; Ramaswamy, 1996). These four points put together lead to the conclusion that, "a service, combined with goods products, is experienced and evaluated by customers who have particular goals and motivations for consumers for consuming the service" (Yong, p.43).

Although there have been many efforts made to understand the concept of service, there is no consensus among researchers on the characteristics of service. According to Yong (2000), the conceptualization could be divided into two groups.

First, some researchers view the concept from the perspective of service itself - they pay attention to the discrepancy between the marketing strategies of service and goods. This approach differentiates service (intangible) from goods (tangible), which suggests that different marketing strategies should be taken for each of these concepts. Parasuraman, Zeithaml, and Berry (1985), and Zeithaml and Bitner (1996) identified four features of service that distinguish it from goods. Service is intangible, heterogeneous, simultaneous, simultaneous in production and consumption, and perishable. This approach distinguishes service from goods, by pointing out the unique features of service. It advances the understanding of the concept. However, it has drawn many critiques. On the one hand, the four characteristics mentioned above are not universal in all service sectors. Wright (1995) criticized this first approach for four reasons. First, a service industry depends more on tangible equipment to satisfy customers' demand while some customers do not care about whether goods are tangible or not. Second, some service businesses are well standardized such as franchise industries. In addition, in some cases, customers value the equality and fairness from the service provided. Third, many services are not simultaneously produced and consumed. Fourth, highly technological or equipment-based services could be standardized. On the other hand, this approach focuses on service and ignores the role of customers (Wyckham, Fitzroy, & Mandry, 1975).

The second approach is based on the ideas of some researchers who view service from the perspective of service customers - they focus on the utility and total value that the service provides for the consumer. This approach points out that service combines tangible and intangible aspects to satisfy customers during the business transaction (Gronroos. 1990; Ramaswamy, 1996). This approach implies that because consumers evaluate service quality in terms of their experiences, customers' subjective perceptions have great impact upon service success or failure (Shostack, 1997).

Conceptualization and Operationalization of Service Quality

Although researchers have studied the concept of service for several decades, there is no consensus about the conceptualization of service quality (Cronin & Taylor, 1992; Rust & Oliver, 1994). Different researchers focused on different aspects of service quality. Reeves & Bednar (1994) noted that "there is no universal, parsimonious, or all-encompassing definition or model of quality" (p. 436).

The most common definition is the traditional notion that views quality as the customer's perception of service excellence. That is to say, quality is defined by the customer's impression of the service provided (Berry, Parasuraman, & Zeithaml, 1988; Parasuraman, Zeithaml, & Berry, 1985). The assumption behind this definition is that customers form the perception of service quality according to the service performance they experience and based on past experiences of service performance. It is therefore the customer's perception that categorizes service quality.

Many researchers accept this approach of service quality. For example, Bitner and Hubbert (1994) defined quality as "the consumer's overall impression of the relative inferiority/superiority of the organization and its services"(p. 77). For instance, Bitner and Hubbert's (1994) definition of service quality differs from that of the traditional approach. The traditional approach for defining service quality emphasizes that service quality perception is a comparison of consumer expectations with actual performance (Gronroos, 1984; Lewis & Booms, 1983; Parasuraman, Zeithaml, & Berry, 1985; Parasuraman, Zeithaml, & Berry, 1990). Parasuraman, Zeithaml, and Berry (1985) viewed quality as "the degree and direction of discrepancy between customers' service perception and expectations" (Parasuraman, Zeithaml, & Berry, 1985). According to this approach, services are different from goods because they are intangible, heterogeneous and are simultaneously produced and consumed. Additionally, as the disconfirmation paradigm states, service quality is a comparison between consumers' expectations and their perceptions of the service they actually receive.

Service Quality Models

Based on this traditional definition of service quality, Parasuraman, Zeithaml, and Berry (1985) developed the "Gap Model" of perceived service quality. This model has five gaps: (a) the gap between management perceptions of consumer's expectations and expected service, (b) the gap between management perceptions of consumer's expectations and the translation of perceptions into service quality specification, (c) the gap between translation of perceptions of service quality specification and service delivery, (d) the gap between service delivery and external communications to consumers, and (e) the gap between the customer's expected level of service and the actual service performance. As mentioned above, this disconfirmation paradigm conceptualizes the perception of service quality as a difference between the expected level of service and the actual service performance. They revealed the following 10 second-order dimensions that are used by consumers in assessing service quality in a broad variety of service sectors: (a) tangibles, (b) reliability, (c) responsiveness, (d) competence, (e) courtesy, (f) credibility, (g) security, (h) access, (i) communication, (j) understanding (Parasuraman et al., 1985).

Using these 10 dimensions, Parasuraman et al. (1988) made the first effort to operationalize the concept of service quality. They developed an instrument to assess service quality that empirically relied on the difference in scores between expectations and perceived performance. The instrument consisted of 22 items divided along the 10 second-order dimensions previously listed, with a seven-point answer scale accompanying each statement to test the strength of relations. These 22 items were used to represent five dimensions: Reliability, Responsiveness, Tangibles, Assurance, and Empathy.

Reliability refers to the ability to perform the promised service dependently and accurately. Responsiveness reflects the willingness to help a customer and provide prompt service. Tangible refers to the appearance of the physical facilities, equipment, personnel and
communication material. Empathy refers to caring, individualized attention the firm provides its customer. (Yong, 2000, p.66)

In their seminal study, SERQUAL measures service quality as a gap between expectation and perception in an appliance repair and maintenance firm, several retail banks, a long-distance telephone provider, a securities broker, and credit card companies (Parasuraman et al., 1988). This study provided a comprehensive conceptualization of service quality with an instrument to measure perceived service quality for the first time in service quality studies. It became very popular among service quality researchers.

However, several researchers challenged the usefulness of the SERVQUAL scale as a measure of service quality by pointing out its shortcomings (e.g., Babakus & Boller, 1992; Brown, Churchill, & Peter, 1993; Carmen, 1990; Cronin & Taylor, 1992; Dabholkar, Thorpe, & Rentz, 1996). For example, Carman (1990) selected four service settings that were quite different from those used in the original test. He found that in some situations, SERVQUAL needs to be customized by adding items or changing the wording of items, though it was originally designed to be a generic instrument for measuring service quality at any sector. In addition, he also suggested that the five dimensions in SERVQUAL are not sufficient to meet service quality measurement needs, and that the measurement of expectation in SERVQUAL is problematic.

Finn and Lamb, (1991), found that "the SERVQUAL measurement model is not appropriate in a retail setting" (p.487). They argued "that retailers and consumer researchers should not treat SERVQUAL as an 'off the shelf' measure of perceived quality. Much refinement is needed for specific companies and industries" (p.489). According to Brown, Churchill, & Peter (1993) using the difference in scores causes a number of problems in such areas as reliability, discriminate validity, spurious correlations, and variance restriction. Finally, Cronin and Taylor (1992) argued that the disconfirmation paradigm that SERVQUAL applied was inappropriate for measuring perceived service quality. They pointed out that the disconfirmation paradigm measures customer satisfaction instead of service quality. In their study, Cronin and Taylor (1992) used the performance scale (SERVPERF) only, and found that SERVPERF outperformed SERVQUAL.

SERVQUAL's shortcomings result from the weakness of the traditional definition that it applies. It is noted that there are several problems in the traditional (disconfirmatory) definition of service quality (Yong, 2000). First, customers' needs are not always easy to identify. If their need is not correctly identified, conformance to a specification is not proper. Schneider and Bowen (1995) pointed out that "customers bring a complex and multidimensional set of expectations to the service encounter. Customers come with expections for more than a smile and handshake. Their expectations include conformance to at least ten service quality attributes (i.e., Parasuraman, et al.'s 10 dimensions-reliability, responsiveness, competence, access, courtesy, communication, credibility, security, understanding, and tangible)"(p. 29.). Second, the traditional definitions failed to provide a way to measure customers' expectation, which determines the level of service quality. Customer's expectations may fluctuate greatly over time (Reeves & Bednar, 1994). Therefore, it is not parsimonious to define quality in terms of customer's expectations. Empirically it is not valid to use the difference in scores between expectation and perceived service quality to measure service quality.

Oliver (1997) also pointed out the traditional model's shortcomings by distinguishing quality from satisfaction. First, while quality perceptions could come from external mediation instead of experience of service, satisfaction has to be experienced by consumers in person. In addition, quality judgments standards are based on ideals or perceptions of excellence, while satisfaction judgments include predictive expectations, needs, product category norms, and even expectations of service quality. Moreover, while quality judgment is mainly cognitive, satisfaction is an affective experience (Bitner & Hubbert, 1994; Oliver, 1994). Service quality is influenced by very few variables such as external cues like price, reputation, and various communication sources, while satisfaction is more vulnerable to cognitive and affective processes such as equity, attribution, and emotion. Quality is primarily long-term while satisfaction is primarily short-term.

Yong (2000) summarized analyses by researchers' discussions of service quality definitions and pointed out that service quality should be clarified as follows. First, from the above analyses, it could be noted that the disconfirmation paradigm, which compared the perceived service quality and expectation, is not appropriate in defining service quality (Yong, 2000). Second, because service quality may not require the customer's experience and consumption, the disconfirmation paradigm does not clarify service quality (Yong, 2000). Third, service loyalty is easier to measure if the judgment occurs primarily at the attribute-based cognitive level. Fourth, a customer's perception of quality has been the main focus of the service quality research. Fifth, the overall impression of consumers determines service quality. Sixth, service is not uniform - in different service sectors consumers' perception of service quality may be different. Seventh, service quality is multidimensional or multifaceted. Eighth, service quality should be clearly differentiated from customer satisfaction.

Several researchers approached service quality from perspectives quite different from Parasuraman et al. (1988). On the one hand, some scholars provide multi-dimensional models of service quality. At first, Gronroos (1984) used a two-dimensional model to study service quality. The first dimension is Technical Quality that refers to the outcome of the service performance. The second dimension is Functional Quality that refers to the subjective perception of how the service is delivered. It is the reflection of the consumer's perception of the interactions between consumers and service providers. According to his model, these two dimensions of service performance are compared to the customer's expectations and eventually the customer has his/her own service quality perception. Later, McDougall and Levesque (1994) added a third dimension - physical environment to Gronroos' (1984) model and proposed the Three Factor Model of Service Quality. It consists of service outcome, service process (Gronroos 1984), and physical environment. They tested the model by a confirmatory factor analysis using the dimensions of the SERVQUAL scale, which provided empirical support for the model. These three components in the above models, together with Rust and Oliver's (1994) service product, represent one important aspect of services. All of them contribute to consumers' perception of service quality (Yong, 2000).

On the other hand, Dabholkar, Thorpe, and Tentz (1996) proposed a hierarchical model of service quality. This model suggests that service quality is a multi-level and multi-dimensional construct, including (a) consumers' overall perception of service quality, (b) a dimension level which consists of physical aspects, reliability, personal interaction, problem solving, and policy, and (c) a sub-dimension level which recognizes the multifaceted nature of the service quality dimensions They found that quality of service is directly influenced by the perceptions of performance levels. In addition, customers' personal characteristics are important in assessing value, but not quality.

At last, Brady (1997) combined these two lines. He developed a hierarchical and multidimensional model of perceived service quality by combining Dabholkar, Thorpe, and Tentz's (1996) hierarchical model and McDougall and Levesque's (1994) Three Factor Model (Brady, 1997). There are three dimensions in the model: interaction quality, outcome quality, and physical environment quality. Each of these dimensions consists of three corresponding subdimensions: (a) Interaction Quality- Attitued, Behavior, and Expertise, (b) Outcome Quality-Waiting Time, Tangibles and Valence, (c) Physical Environment Quality- Ambient Conditions, Design, and Social Factors. This hierarchical and multidimensional approach is believed to better explain the complexity of human perceptions than the conceptualizations currently offered in the literature (Dabholkar, Thorpe, & Rentz, 1996; Brady, 1997). The empirical test of this model shows that the model is psychometrically sound.

Yong (2000) further developed Brady's (1997) model in his study of service quality in recreational sport. He proposed that perception of service quality consist of four dimensions. They are as follows: (a) program quality - range of activity programs, operating time, and secondary services, (b) interaction quality, (c) outcome quality, and (d) environment quality. He tested the model using the two-step approach of structural equation modeling and supported the multi-dimensional conceptualization of service quality perception.

In short, perception of service quality is a controversial subject with no consensus having been reached on how to conceptualize or operationalize the construct. SERVQUAL, which applies the traditional disconfirmatory model, was the first effort to operationalize service quality. Although it made great contribution to the field of service quality, it is insufficient because of its inherent weakness. More recent models such as Brady's (1997) hierarchical multidimensional model synthesize prior approaches and represent the complexity of the construct of service quality perception.

Conclusion

Perception of service quality is quite a controversial topic - so far no consensus has been reached on how to conceptualize or operationalize this construct. This article gave a review of the existing literature about service quality. It explored the concepts of service, service quality, consumers' perceptions of service quality, and the conceptualization and operationalization of the construct of service quality. It also discussed several models of service quality that serve to better explain and measure this concept. SERVQUAL, which applies the traditional disconfirmatory model, represents the first effort to operationalize service quality. Although it made great contribution to the field of service quality and was very popular among service quality researchers in many areas, it is thought to be insufficient because of its conceptual weaknesses caused by the disconfirmatory paradigm, and its empirical inappropriateness. Later service quality researchers applied models with more dimensions. Brady later developed a hierarchical and multidimensional model of perceived service quality by combining the ideas of earlier researchers. More recent approaches such as Brady's (1997) hierarchical multidimensional model utilize ideas seen in earlier models, yet further represent the complexity of the concept of service quality perception.

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