An Assessment of the Reliability and Validity of the SERVQUAL Scale in the Higher Education Context of Tanzania

Abstract

Although service quality has received increasing attention in higher education, there is lack of a standardized instrument to measure it.  The most popular and widely used instrument to measure service quality across industries is the SERVQUAL scale. However, since the SERVQUAL scale was developed in the retail commercial sector, its reliability and validity for measuring service quality in the higher  education sector has been questioned. This is because higher education sector differs significantly from the retail commercial sector for  whichthe SERVQUAL scale was developed and widely applied. This paper assesses the applicability of the SERVQUAL scale for measuring  service quality in higher education, particularly in the context of Tanzania. The data were obtained from 500 students in two public  universities in Tanzania. The study found out that, the SERVQUAL scale, as modified for this study, is reliable and valid for measuring  service quality in the higher education sector.