Psychometrics Of Hotel Service Quality: Comparative Factor Structures Of Alternative Market Segments

When different market segments are encountered, can the same instrument be used to understand and predict the determinants of customer perceptions of service quality, satisfaction and retention?  This paper analyzes a national sample of over 18,000 U.S. customer surveys regarding hotel experiences in a range of properties from budget to near-luxury accommodations.  Its purpose is to examine the dimensionality of customer satisfaction for business vs. pleasure travelers, and male vs. female guests, in order to determine the appropriateness of conceptualizing and measuring service quality with the same instrument for these potentially divergent segments.  Our findings provide good evidence of factor stability across these segments, using the multi-item scales that are employed by one of the largest privately held hotel chains in the United States.  Within the common factor structure, modest but intuitively reasonable differences in the importance of service attributes in determining customer loyalty for different segments do emerge

Assessment of Major Depressive Disorders through Neuroimaging Studies and Their Treatment Methods

Many mental disorders are caused due to improper regulation of the brain and depression is one such. It affects both children and adults and is very common among teenagers. There are many challenges clinicians face regarding the management of this disease. These challenges have prompted the development of various neuroimaging techniques that effectively diagnose the condition. The main techniques are Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and Positron emission tomography (PET) which have gained momentum over the years. Advanced MRI techniques help study certain regions of the brain such as hippocampus and amygdala. Effective treatments for depression include antidepressant medications and brain stimulation techniques. Although treatments are effective for a lot of people, there is still room for improvement. This article (1) presents background on depression, its types, symptoms and risk factors; (2) elaborates the neuroimaging techniques used and reviews the various techniques adopted over the years to study depression; and (3) discusses the treatment methods that can be practised to cure depression

The Sustainability Liability: Potential Negative Effects of Ethicality on Product Preference

Manufacturers are increasingly producing and promoting sustainable products (i.e., products that have a positive social and/or environmental impact). However, relatively little is known about how product sustainability affects consumers\u27 preferences. Theauthors propose that sustainability may not always be an asset, even if most consumers care about social and environmental issues. The degree to which sustainability enhances preference depends on the type of benefit consumers most value for theproduct category in question. In this research, the authors demonstrate that consumers associate higher product ethicality with gentleness-related attributes and lower product ethicality with strength-related attributes. As a consequence of these associations, the positive effect of product sustainability on consumer preferences is reduced when strength-related attributes are valued, sometimes even resulting in preferences for less sustainable product alternatives (i.e., the sustainability liability ). Conversely, when gentleness-related attributes are valued, sustainability enhances preference. In addition, the authors show that the potential negative impact of sustainability on product preferences can be attenuated using explicit cues about productstrength