A combined fuzzy‐SEM evaluation approach to identify the key drivers of the academic library service quality in the digital technology era: An empirical study

Abstract

A conceptual model of the Academic Library (AL) service quality is hypothesized in the present article, and then validated and analyzed by a novel evaluation approach. Specifically, the conceptual model integrates the fundamental attributes of the canonical AL service together with those more relevant of the new and widely considered AL Electronic Service (e‐services). As concerns the evaluation approach, it incorporates the Fuzzy Sets Theory (FST) so as to deal with the students' uncertainty over their own judgments on the AL service quality and a Structural Equation Model (SEM) to validate the conceptual model and to determine the key drivers of the AL service quality. The effectiveness of the proposed approach is proved by an empirical study concerning the AL of the Polytechnic School of the University of Palermo (Italy). Data collected via a survey involving more than 600 students are used, and the key drivers of the AL service quality are found out. Particularly, the obtained results reveal that Collections and materials represents the main driver of the AL service quality followed by Infrastructure and Access to the service, whereas Staff plays the fundamental role of interface between AL service aspects and students' needs and necessities.

Global research on library service quality: a bibliometric analysis and knowledge mapping

“…However, no bibliometric study has been conducted on LSQ so far. There have been various empirical studies conducted solely on LSQ, including those by Wu et al (2019) on improving LSQ from the perspective of big data; Hossain (2020) on user satisfaction and LSQ; Kumar and Mahajan (2019a) on evaluating LSQ of the University of Kashmir; Choshaly and Mirabolghasemi (2019) on assessing users satisfaction of LSQ; Gathoni and Van der Walt (2019) on evaluating LSQ from TQM approach; Mallya and Payini (2019) on an evaluation of students' perceptions of LSQ; Long et al (2019) on measuring users' satisfaction with university LSQ; Griadhi et al (2018) on the effect of LSQ on motivation and learning achievement; Jackson (2017) on measuring of university rankings through LSQ; and an empirical study by La Fata and Lupo (2017) to identify the key drivers of the academic LSQ in the digital technology era, etc. Hence, by conducting a bibliometric analysis on LSQ, this study is an attempt to fill the gap in the literature.…”

Unveiling the research pattern and trends in library service quality studies: A meta-narrative review

“…Four studies indicated the sub category of 'library environment' as one of the dimensions (Afthanorhan et al, 2019;Mohindra and Kumar, 2015;Xi et al, 2018), identified 25 failure items, which need to improve the quality of services by converting the verbal expressions in the intuitionistic fuzzy environment (Tooranloo et al, 2018). Interestingly, 'library staff' has remained in the focus by five different studies, which indicate that staff plays the vital role to connect library services with the users' needs (Bae and Cha, 2015;Dash and Padhi, 2016;Manuela La Fata and Lupo, 2017;Mat Dahan et al, 2016;Mohindra and Kumar, 2015).…”

“…Regarding the sub-categories of user perception, there are various instances where the user perception was examined and explored on different samples from various libraries across the globe. Users' viewpoints/judgements/perceptions or their open-comments recorded through LibQUAL+ tool were explored to determine the service quality of libraries (Cabrerizo et al, 2017;De Jager, 2015;Guder, 2017;Kumar and Mahajan, 2019b;Luther, 2015;McCaffrey and Breen, 2016;Manuela La Fata and Lupo, 2017;Moore, 2017;Natesan et al, 2015;Sullo, 2019). Besides examining user perceptions through LibQUAL+ studies, researchers found evidence of ServQUAL studies too where the perceptions of library users were analysed by adopting TQM methodology and DEMATEL technique (Chen, 2016;Gathoni and Van der Walt, 2019).…”

Social Service Model and Value Evaluation of Libraries under Sharing Economy

“…eir development involves numerous factors [11][12][13]. To complement government fiscal investment, Siregar and Dewiyana [14] optimized the public cultural service system, built up a public-private partnership (PPP) service supply model for libraries, and analyzed the intrinsic logic of introducing the model.…”