Kathryn Frazer Winsted, Ph.D.
Pace University
861 Bedford Road
Pleasantville, NY 10598
914/773-3905
FAX: 914/773-3908
email: winsted@pace.edu
Do consumers in different countries want the same thing from a service provider? Are there differences in how they want and expect to be treated? Do consumers expect to be treated differently by a provider of a professional service than a generic service? If so, what are the differences in what they expect?
This paper poses hypotheses regarding expected differences between countries and between industries of the relative importance to consumers of eight service encounter dimensions: authenticity of behavior, caring, customer control, courtesy, friendliness, formality, personalization, and promptness.
Empirical research using two independent samples of 100-200 in each of Japan and the United States finds support for many of the hypotheses. Among these are that formality is more important in status-conscious societies than in egalitarian societies and that personalization is more important in individualistic countries than in collectivist countries. Also, authenticity is more important for professional service industries than for generic services, while courtesy and promptness are more important for generic services.
Click here to return to Kathy
Winsted Home Page.