A Conceptual Model of Service Quality and Its Implications for Future Research

A. Parasuraman, Valarie A. ZelthamI, & Leonard L Berry

A Conceptual Model of Service Quality and Its Implications for Future Research
The attainment of quality in products and services has become a pivotal concern of the 1980s. While quality in tangible goods has been described and measured by marketers, quality in services is largely undefined and unresearched. The authors attempt to rectify this situation by reporting the insights obtained in an extensive exploratory investigation of quality in four service businesses and by developing a model of service quality. Propositions and recommendations to stimulate future research about service quality are offered.

"People want some wise and perceptive statemeni like. 'Quality is ballet, not hockey. ' "—Philip Crosby ( 1979)

UALITY is an and indistinct construct. QOften mistakenelusiveimprecise adjectives like for "goodness, or luxury, or shininess, or weight" (Crosby 1979), quality and its requirements are not easily articulated by consumers (Takeuchi and Quelch 1983). Explication and measurement of quality also present problems for researchers (Monroe and Krishnan 1983), who often bypass definitions and use unidimensional self-report measures to capture the concept (Jacoby, Olson, and Haddock 1973; McConneli 1968; Shapiro 1972). While the substance and determinants of quality may be undefined, its importance to firms and consumers is unequivocal. Research has demonstrated the strategic benefits of quality in contributing to market share and return on investment (e.g., Anderson and Zeithaml 1984; Phillips, Chang, and Buzzell 1983) as well as in lowering manufacturing costs and improv-

ing productivity (Garvin 1983). The search for quality is arguably the most important consumer trend of Ihe 1980s (Rabin 1983) as consumers are now demanding higher quality in products than ever before TLeonard and Sa.sser 1982, Takeuchi and Quelch 1983). Few academic researchers have attempted to define and model quality

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