Expanding the Methodological Approach to the Social Servicescape: Moving From Measurement to Manipulation

Abstract

Recently, research of the servicescape has expanded to include a social element in addition to the traditionally identified physical/tangible element. Typically, this social servicescape construct has been treated as a measured variable, reflecting the other customers in the service environment across three dimensions (i.e., similarity, behavior, and appearance). However, the exclusive use of measurement to operationalize a phenomenon limits both the types of methods that can be used and, correspondingly, the types of research questions that can be asked. Accordingly, the purpose of this research is to propose and test a scenario-based manipulation of the customer social servicescape construct so that future research can address the phenomenon using experimental design. Scenarios crossing the social servicescape with social density (i.e., crowding) are constructed in three different domains (restaurant, hotel, and retail) and tested in terms of their nomological validity by assessing the effects of the manipulated variables on attitudes and satisfaction. Our results demonstrate that the three elements of the social servicescape—similarity, appearance, and behavior—each had a direct and significant effect on attitude and satisfaction. In addition, these results were consistent across the hotel, restaurant, and retail contexts. The clarity and consistency of these findings indicate the viability of the social servicescape manipulations as a research tool.

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