An Exploration of the Relationship between Service Quality, Users’ Satisfaction, and Loyalty in the Academic Libraries

Abstract

Service quality, users’ satisfaction, and loyalty have been studied as an integral and vital part in library growth and sustainability. This study explored the relationship between perceived service quality, users’ satisfaction and loyalty in the academic library in Nigeria. Using a convenience sampling technique through aquestionnaire, this study elicited responses from 141 postgraduate and undergraduate students who had used the library web-based service. The 141 valid data were analyzed descriptively with spss 20 version and structural equation modeling was conducted using AMOS version 20 to test the hypotheses. The result showed that there is a direct positive relation between service quality and user loyalty, also, service quality influenced loyalty indirectly through users’ satisfaction. This study revealed that measurement of service quality, particularly, web-based service quality is a vital step towards user retention in the academic library.