OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT

OPM 770
INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT
ARTICLE CRITIQUE
THE ROLE OF SERVICESCAPE AND IMAGE PERCEPTIONS OF CUSTOMERS
ON BEHAVIORAL INTENTIONS IN THE HOTEL INDUSTRY
CLASS:
AA7002DF
PREPARED BY:
FATIN SYAFIRA BINTI ZAKARIA

2015464554

PREPARED FOR:
AP PROF DR. SITI HALIJJAH BINTI SHARIFF
SUBMIT:
12TH MAY 2016

The Summary of The Article

The title of the journal article is The Role of Servicescape And Image Perceptions of
Customers on Behavioral Intentions In The Hotel Industry which written by Ufuk Durna and
Bekir Bora Dedeoglu from Tourism Management Depatment of Akdeniz University, Turkey
and Sevgi Balikcioglu from Travel Management Department of Mustafa Kemal University,
Turkey. Usually, most studies that have investigating servicescape percepstion of customers
have generally been carried out on restaurants. Hence this study were carried out to examine
the relationship between servicescape components, image and behavioural intention within
the framework of hotel businesses. More than that, this study also hopes to create an
aweareness of the importances of servicescape in the hotel sector with a concept that can
create positive business image and the study also provided some specific recommendation
regarding to the sercvicescape components which could help the hotel companies to improve
their business image. The external sources have been used in completing this study such as
articles, website and journals articles about servicescape, corporate image, behavioural
intention and hotel industry that have been retrieved from the internet from the year 1968 to
2014. This non-contrieved of study setting have have drop and collect 750 questionnaires
which in German, Russian, Turkish and English language to the tourists who majority came
from German and Russia at various businesses such as restaurants, clothing stores, beaches as
well as hotels around Antalya. The study choose Antalya because the number of tourists that
staying there were the higher in Turki. However there 463 copies of them were returned and
only 410 were analyzed as they were suitable for analyzing. To analyzed the data, this study
preferred Structural Equation Model (SEM) to test the model created in this study. This study
also used mediation analysis which is BK method to investigate the mediator role of overall
between servicescape and behavioral intention components. This study proved that
servicescape components have a positive effect on overall image which havethe same effect
on word-of-mouth and re-visiting. Last but not least, the managers who want to present a
positive business images, should design an up to date and unique servicescape components
which can make the customer experience something that they can remember and achieving
the expectation of the target markets.

The Article Critique

The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between servicescape components,
image and behavioural intention within the framework of hotel businesses. The purpose of
study was clear and concisely stated and suit with the title. Besides, the objectives of the study
were answerable which the writers choose to obtain them by testing null hypotheses. These
hypotheses were testable. My suggestion is the writer should refer the latest sources which are
five years from the year of study. The problem statement of this study was not clearly stated
and visible to the average reader. The writer should have a problem statement that clearly
explains about the problem of servicescape in hotel industry. On the other hand, the literiture
review of this study were clearly explained where every stage of readers would gain a lot of
information about servicescape, corporate image and behavioural intention. However, the data
used in completing this study included those from external sources such as websites and
journals articles about the servicescape, corporate image, behavioural intention and hotel
industry that have been retrieved from the year 1968 to 2014. The methods used to gather the
data for this article were obviously explained. The instruments and development were
explained evidently while the reliability coefficients of all possible tests were given in the
study. The findings regarding the mediating role of business image between servicescape
components and behavioral intentions could be beneficial for the future studies. The
customers overall image perceptions of the hotel industry were examined in this study where
the business image is composed of functional and emotive components. business image is
composed of functional and emotive components. Therefore, business image should be
examined multi-dimensionally in terms of providing more comprehensive and beneficial
information and we can deciding which servicescape image components are more effective
easily. In the literiture review, this study considering that behavioral intentions include
negative intentions, such as complaining behavior and switching to competitors, as well as
positive ones such as pay premium price and in my opinion this study should examining this
component in the study to gain a better results.

REFERENCE
Ufuk Durna Bekir Bora Dedeoglu Sevgi Balikioglu , (2015),"The Role Of Servicescape And
Image Perceptions Of Customers On Behavioral Intentions In The Hotel Industry",
International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, Vol. 27 Iss 7 pp.
1728 - 1748