A student's overall satisfaction with his/her educational experience has traditionally been measured by a simple 'yes or no' question, or with one question assessing the degree of overall satisfaction. Even though this type of question is simple to answer and analyze, students may not thoroughly reflect upon their previous responses within a questionnaire regarding satisfaction with individual educational attributes when asked to assess their overall satisfaction with a university on the basis of a single question. The purpose of this article is to present an alternative approach to measuring student overall satisfaction using a multiple-item weighted gap score analysis approach. The results suggest that this approach may have more diagnostic value to both academics and practitioners.

Student Satisfaction: An alternative approach to assessing this important concept

Background Limited resources coupled with unlimited demand for healthcare mean that decisions have to be made regarding the allocation of scarce resources across competing interventions. Policy documents have advocated the importance of public views as one such criterion. In principle, the elicitation of public values represents a big step forward. However, for the exercise to be worthwhile, useful information must be obtained that is scientifically defensible, whilst decision-makers must be able and willing to use it. Aims and objectives The aim was to identify techniques that could be reasonably used to elicit public views on the provision of healthcare. Hence, the objectives were: (1) to identify research methods with the potential to take account of public views on the delivery of healthcare; (2) to identify criteria for assessing these methods; (3) to assess the methods identified according to the predefined criteria; (4) to assess the importance of public views vis-a-vis other criteria for setting priorities, as judged by a sample of decision-makers; (5) to make recommendations regarding the use of methods and future research. Methods A systematic literature review was carried out to identify methods for eliciting public views. Criteria currently used to evaluate such methods were identified. The methods identified were then evaluated according to predefined criteria. A questionnaire-based survey assessed the relative importance of public views vis-a-vis five other criteria for setting priorities: potential health gain; evidence of clinical effectiveness; budgetary impact; equity of access and health status inequalities; and quality of service. Two techniques were used: choice-based conjoint analysis and allocation of points technique. The questionnaire was sent to 143 participants. A subsample was followed up with a telephone interview. Results The methods identified were classified as quantitative or qualitative. RESULTS - QUANTITATIVE TECHNIQUES: Quantitative techniques, classified as ranking, rating or choice-based approaches, were evaluated according to eight criteria: validity; reproducibility; internal consistency; acceptability to respondents; cost (financial and administrative); theoretical basis; whether the technique offered a constrained choice; and whether the technique provided a strength of preference measure. Regarding ranking exercises, simple ranking exercises have proved popular, but their results are of limited use. The qualitative discriminant process has not been used to date in healthcare, but may be useful. Conjoint analysis ranking exercises did well against the above criteria. A number of rating scales were identified. The visual analogue scale has proved popular within the quality-adjusted life-year paradigm, but lacks constrained choice and may not measure strength of preference. However, conjoint analysis rating scales performed well. Methods identified for eliciting attitudes include Likert scales, the semantic differential technique, and the Guttman scale. These methods provide useful information, but do not consider strength of preference or the importance of different components within a total score. Satisfaction surveys have been frequently used to elicit public opinion. Researchers should ensure that they construct sensitive techniques, despite their limited use, or else use generic techniques where validity has already been established. Service quality (SERVQUAL) appears to be a potentially useful technique and its application should be researched. Three choice-based techniques with a limited application in healthcare are measure of value, the analytical hierarchical process and the allocation of points technique, while those more widely used, and which did well against the predefined criteria, include standard gamble, time trade-off, discrete choice conjoint analysis and willingness to pay. Little methodological work is currently available on the person trade-off. RESULTS - QUALITATIVE TECHNIQUES: Qualitative techniques were classified as either individual or group-based approaches. Individual approaches included one-to-one interviews, dyadic interviews, case study analyses, the Delphi technique and complaints procedures. Group-based methods included focus groups, concept mapping, citizens' juries, consensus panels, public meetings and nominal group techniques. Six assessment criteria were identified: validity; reliability; generalisability; objectivity; acceptability to respondents; and cost. Whilst all the methods have distinct strengths and weaknesses, there is a lot of ambiguity in the literature. Whether to use individual or group methods depends on the specific topic being discussed and the people being asked, but for both it is crucial that the interviewer/moderator remains as objective as possible. The most popular and widely used such methods were one-to-one interviews and focus groups. (ABSTRACT TRUNCATED)

Eliciting public preferences for healthcare: a systematic review of techniques.

In order to attract and retain students, universities must identify and meet student expectations. This article examines which aspects of a student's educational experience are more important in influencing student satisfaction. The findings show that “student centered-ness,” “campus climate,” and “instructional effectiveness,” have a strong impact on how satisfied a student is with his/her overall educational experience. The results also suggest that recruitment strategies may require emphasizing different aspects of a student's educational experience than retentio strategies.

Key Factors Influencing Student Satisfaction Related to Recruitment and Retention

The authors investigate the overall and subarea influence of a comprehensive set of marketing and marketing-related journals at three points in time during a 30-year period using a citation-based measure of structural influence. The results show that a few journals wield a disproportionate amount of influence in the marketing journal network as a whole and that influential journals tend to derive their influence from many different journals. Different journals are most influential in different subareas of marketing; general business and managerially oriented journals have lost influence, whereas more specialized marketing journals have gained in influence over time. The Journal of Marketing emerges as the most influential marketing journal in the final period (1996-97) and as the journal with the broadest span of influence across all subareas. Yet the Journal of Marketing is notably influential among applied marketing journals, which themselves are of lesser influence. The index of structural inf...

https://www.jstor.org/stable/info/30040527

The structural influence of marketing journals: A citation analysis of the discipline and its subareas over time

This work centers on the study of the image of universities, with the aims of explaining the process of image forming by means of its different components, both in its cognitive and affective dimensions and of analyzing its relationship with the students’ satisfaction with the university. The results of the empirical work carried out on a representative sample of 6,775 students studying at a Spanish university demonstrate that the cognitive component of image is an antecedent of the affective component. In turn, both of those components influence the forming of the overall image of the university and the cognitive, affective and overall images statistically and significantly influence the students’ satisfaction with the university.

The configuration of the university image and its relationship with the satisfaction of students

The present research examined relationships between satisfaction and quality judgments of college services. Students (N = 736) completed a questionnaire (SERVQUAL) to investigate perceived service performance of a university college. At the same time, they were asked about satisfaction with specific aspects of the program offered by the college. Three dependent measures of satisfaction were used: global satisfaction, willingness to recommend the college, and satisfaction with value received from the educational experience. Results indicated that the perceived quality of the educational offering and service quality explained different amounts of the variance in satisfaction. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of the relative importance of actual and augmented product characteristics in explaining satisfaction.

Student as Customer: Factors Affecting Satisfaction and Assessments of Institutional Quality

The goal of this study was to examine responses among dental patients to the most recent version of SERVQUAL, and to evaluate that instrument as a tool for measuring satisfaction in a dental practice. Items on the reliability and responsiveness dimensions produced the lowest satisfaction ratings, while improvements in providing services as promised and instilling confidence have the greatest potential for producing higher satisfaction among patients. Finally, using open-ended questions, we identified a number of patient events or experiences which caused either high or low scores on individual SERVQUAL items.

Identifying Service Quality Strengths and Weaknesses Using SERVQUAL: A Study of Dental Services

The principal purpose of this study is to identify the “prestige” of journals that publish papers in marketing, as seen by department chairmen or other administrators in charge of marketing faculty.

Perceived Quality of Marketing Journals

This article traces the recent extension of the frequent-flier concept to Australia, describes the lessons learned from the American experience, and examines both the passenger characteristics and the corporate responses to the travel bonus program in Australia.

William G. Browne

Papers

Student as Customer: Factors Affecting Satisfaction and Assessments of Institutional Quality

Identifying Service Quality Strengths and Weaknesses Using SERVQUAL: A Study of Dental Services

Perceived Quality of Marketing Journals

Frequent-flier programs: the australian experience

A three stage product review process