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Consumer Expectation Formation In Health Care Services: A Psycho-Social Model, Kenneth Randall Russ

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

A psycho-social model of consumer expectation formation in a health care services context was developed and tested. A field study involving obstetrical patients (n=171) at a large women’s specialty hospital in the southeast was conducted. Initial support for the structural model which posits that consumer expectations in health care services are multidimensional involving role, process, outcome, and service quality was found. Furthermore, the research identified that the uncertainty of a health service encounter may cause certain consumer segments to choose coping strategies and expectation processes based on their locus of control orientation from along a continuum ranging from “approach-active” to …