Consumer research in the restaurant environment. Part 2: Research design and analytical methods

Abstract

In Part 1, a model of dining satisfaction and return patronage was developed and described. Based on extensive review of the relevant consumer behaviour literature the model was developed and underpinned by the disconfirmation and expectancy theory. As noted in the article, disconfirmation theory is widely accepted as an account of the process by which customers develop feelings of satisfaction or dissatisfaction, that is, when customers compare new dining experiences with some basis that they have developed from prior experiences. On the other hand, the assumption that a customer will weigh various restaurant attributes is based on expectancy theory. In the majority of studies using disconfirmation theory, expectations are formed according to customers’ pre‐experience beliefs and standards that they use to measure their purchase experience. These theories bring together the social, psychological and cultural concepts into four distinct groups of variables: input variables both internal and external, process variables and output variables (Lowenberg et al. , 1979; Finkelstein, 1989). This paper is a continuation and explains: how the model of dining satisfaction and return patronage was operationalised, that is, how the research instrument was developed; how the sample size and survey procedures were developed and conducted; and how the selection of analytical procedures was conceived.