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Chapter 2 Literature review

2.1 Service value

Service value is conceptualized as the consumers’ evaluation of the utility of perceived benefits and perceived sacrifices (Zeithaml, 1988). In very broad terms, consumers may cognitively integrate their perceptions of what they get (i.e., benefits) versus what they have to give up (i.e., sacrifices) in order to receive services. This broad representation however can change depending on the type of product because for many products, some consumers may seek good price deals while for others they seek more than monetary gains. This may be why Zeithaml’s (1988) study resulted in four meanings of value for consumers:

low price, whatever one wants in a product, quality customer receives versus price paid, and what the customer gets versus what he/she gives. Among these four definitions, the last definition has been the main interest for most perceived value studies in marketing (Petrick et al., 1999).

Analysis of perceived value literature in marketing reveals that two perspectives have been used to model consumers’ value perceptions: utilitarian and behavioural (Jayanti and Ghosh, 1996).

Utilitarian approach to perceived value. Monroe (1990) and Thaler (1985) argued that consumers’ value perceptions are the result of their comparisons among different price structures including advertised selling price, advertised reference price and internal reference price. Monroe (1990) suggested that sellers constantly introduce advertised selling prices (sale price) and advertised

reference prices (higher or regular prices) to influence buyers’ internal reference prices, which are formed after processing relevant information (Monroe, 1990).

Therefore, internal reference price helps buyers to form their price expectations and value the deals around them (Monroe, 1990). According to the utilitarian perspective, perceived value of a product is a combination of acquisition value and transaction value of that product. These two value structures are combined in a way that their subjective weights, which are placed by buyers, are constituted and a perceived value equation is reached:

PV= v1 (AV) + v2 (TV).

Where,

PV= Perceived value of a product AV= Acquisition value of a product TV= Transaction value of a product,

v1 and v2 = Subjective weights placed on AV and TV by buyers.

“Transaction value, or the merit of paying the actual price, was determined by comparing the buyers’ references to the actual price” whereas “acquisition value of the product is the perceived benefits of the product at the maximum price compared to the actual selling price” (Monroe, 1990, p. 75-76).

Acquisition value, according to Monroe (1990) is the maximum price (i.e., Pmax: the highest price that the buyer is ready to pay for the product) less the actual price of the product (p) while transaction value was the buyer’s reference

price (Pref) less the actual price of the product. Hence, PV= v1 (Pmax-p) + v2 (Pref-p)

Where,

AV= Pmax-p, TV= Pref-p

Grewal et al. (1998, p. 48) proposed that “perceived acquisition value is the buyer’s net gain (or trade-off) from acquiring the product or service” while

“perceived transaction value is the perception of psychological satisfaction or pleasure obtained from taking advantage of the financial terms of the price deal.” Therefore, acquisition value reflects a trade-off between perceived benefits and perceived sacrifice (Monroe, 1990) whereas transaction value incorporates the pleasure and satisfaction received from the financial gains from the transaction (Grewal et al., 1998).

Behavioural modelling of perceived value treats the perceived value construct as a more comprehensive construct and attempts to explain it with not only price variations but also with other factors (i.e., psychological antecedents of value perceptions). In her influential paper, Zeithaml (1988) proposed a model of perceived value that was considered an important starting point for many researchers (See Figure 2.1 for the model).

Extrinsic

Higher-level attributes

Perceived

Figure 2.1 A means-end model relating price, quality and value. Adapted from Zeithaml (1988)

Zeithaml (1988) proposed in her model that consumers reach quality perceptions from evaluations of product attributes. Further, consumers use their quality perceptions to form overall value judgments about the products.

Zeithaml (1988) suggested that formation of quality and value perceptions occur in a means-end way. Originally proposed to identify consumers’ product categorization processes, the means-end approach was used to show how means as objects or activities might be related to ends as desired end states or values (Gutman, 1982). From objects through values, three levels of abstraction represent the way consumers retain information in their memory (Zeithaml, 1988). Attributes represent the lowest level in the means-end hierarchy while quality and value judgments serve as the consequences of attributes. Quality and value judgments in return are used to achieve personal goals and values.

In farm tourism, benefits are largely the results of good service quality in both outcome and process domains. Sacrifices from the tourist’s perspective can be divided into two types: the price that tourists have to pay, and non-monetary costs such as time and effort spent (Gallarza and Saura, 2006). Within the identification of benefits and sacrifices, research classified service value to cover three categories: functional value, emotional value, and social value (Sheth et al., 1991; Sheth et al., 1999; Sweeney and Soutar, 2001). Functional value is defined as the perceived utility acquired from an alternative’s capacity for functional, utilitarian, or physical performance (Sheth et al., 1991). In other words, it is the quality of physical outcome of using service, which refers to how well a service serves its principal physical function consistently (Sheth et al., 1999). Sweeney and Soutar (2001) defined emotional value as the perceived utility derived from the feelings or affective states that a service generates. They maintain that services are associated with or facilitate the arousal of specific emotions or feelings; for example, pleasure, relax, enjoy, happiness (Sweeney and Soutar, 2001; Petrick, 2004; Lee et al., 2007; Sánchez et al., 2006). Finally, social value is the utility derived from the service’s ability to enhance social self-concept (Sweeney and Soutar, 2001). Consumers choose the services that convey an image congruent with the norms of their friends and associates, or that convey the social image they wish to project (Sheth et al., 1999).

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