Increasing the interest on service providers service quality, many studies on the service quality have been performed. As the interest and importance of the quality of service increases, it has now become a general trend to consider the university edu...
Increasing the interest on service providers service quality, many studies on the service quality have been performed. As the interest and importance of the quality of service increases, it has now become a general trend to consider the university education in the concept of service. Facing the challenge of market opening in the educational service industry, it is very important for universities to enhance their competitiveness in the world market. In order to do so, it is important to specify the determinants for the service quality for students as the customers of university. However, there have been few studies on the service quality of lectures, which is the core of the educational service at universities.
This research defines the service quality of lectures in five dimensions (tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, assurance, and empathy) according to the SERVQUAL model of Parasuraman et al. (1985, 1988, 1991) and the SERVPERF model of Cronin and Taylor (1992). The two models were chosen because they are the most widely known models for the measurement of the service quality. The effects of the five factors on the service values and service satisfaction of lectures, and the effects of the service values and service satisfaction on students' intension for additional taking or recommendation of the lectures. The effects of the five factors, and the service values and service satisfaction were studied separately for online lectures and offline lectures.
Twelve hundred copies of survey were distributed to eight universities in Korea between April 9th and April 20th, 2010. Among them, 1,025 copies were collected, and the data from 832 completed copies were analyzed.
Frequency analyses, reliability and validity analyses, correlation analyses, confirmatory factor analyses, and path analyses were performed using SPSS 18.0 and SmartPLS 2.0.
The results of this research are as follows.
1. Relationship between the service quality and value of the lectures.
The results show that regarding the traditional offline lectures executed in the lecture rooms, four out of five factors(tangibles, reliability, assurance, and empathy) are significantly correlated with the service value of the lectures. The results also show that three out of five factors(tangibles, assurance, and empathy) are significantly positively correlated with the online lectures.
2. Relationship between the service quality of the lectures and the level of satisfaction for the lectures services.
The results show that two out of five service quality factors(assurance and empathy) are significantly positively correlated with the level of satisfaction for the traditional offline lectures executed in the lecture rooms. The results also show that three out of five factors(tangibles, assurance, and empathy) are significantly correlated with the level of satisfaction for the online lectures.
3. Relationship between the service value of the lectures and the level of satisfaction for the lectures services.
The results show that the service value of the lectures is significantly correlated with the level of satisfaction for both the traditional offline lectures executed in the lecture rooms, and the online lectures with the Internet.
4. Relationship among the service value, the intention for additional taking or recommendation of lectures.
The results show that the service value of the traditional offline lectures executed in the lecture rooms is significantly correlated with the intention of additional taking or recommendation of lectures. The results also show that the service value of the online lectures with the Internet is not significantly correlated with the intention of additional taking or recommendation of lectures.
5. Relationship among the level of satisfaction for the lectures services, the intention for additional taking or recommendation of lectures.
The results show that for both the traditional offline lectures executed in the lecture rooms and the online lectures with the Internet, the level of satisfaction for the lectures services is significantly correlated with the intention of additional taking or recommendation of lectures.
6. Difference among service value variables in regard to the service quality of the offline lectures and online lectures.
For the relationship between the service quality and value of the lectures, the results show that both tangibles and assurance affect more on the service value of offline lectures than that of the online lectures, whereas empathy affects more on the service value of online lectures than that of the offline lectures.
For the relationship between the service quality of the lectures and the level of satisfaction for the lectures services, the results show that assurance affects more on the level of satisfaction for the online lectures than that of the offline lectures, whereas empathy affects more on the level of satisfaction for the offline lectures than that of the online lectures.
Regarding the relationship between the service value of the lectures and the level of satisfaction for the lectures services, the results show that the effect of service value on the level of satisfaction for the online lectures is greater than that for the offline lectures.
Regarding the relationship between the level of satisfaction for the lectures services and the intention of additional taking or recommendation of lectures, the results show that the effect of the level of satisfaction for the online lectures on the intention of additional taking or recommendation of online lectures is greater than that for the online lectures.
In this study, the effects of the five service quality factors(tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, assurance, and empathy) on the service value and the level of satisfaction for lectures services for online and offline lectures were analyzed. In conclusion, the factors that can strengthen the competitiveness of universities by improving the service quality of the lectures are suggested.