Methodology
Anderson and Zwelling36 first applied SERVQUAL
to the health sector, which in turn was
adapted to the Greek health sector characteristics
by Christoglou et al.31 The instrument
included 22 pairs of Likert scale statements
measuring five SERVQUAL service RATER
quality dimensions. A seven-point scale ranging
from strongly agree (7) to strongly disagree
(1) accompanies each statement. The
instrument included paired t-tests consisting of
a sample of matched pairs. Gap mean analyses
based on the gender, the level of education and
age were used to detect how gaps between
perceptions and expectations of quality vary.
An analysis of variance was conducted to test
the mean values of the gaps between expectations
and perceptions, whereas the internal
consistency was assessed via the comparison of
the Chronbach parameters. A series of one-way
ANOVAs were conducted to detect whether there
were any gap mean differences regarding
expectations and perceptions between participants
depending on their age and education.
ANOVAs are used when one wishes to compare
three or more mean values. The F ratio can be
thought of as a measure of how different the
mean values are relative to the variability
within each sample. The larger this value, the
greater the likelihood that the differences
between mean values.