Student’s Co-Creation Behavior in a Business and Economic Bachelor’s Degree in Italy: Influence of Perceived Service Quality, Institutional Image, and Loyalty

Roberta Pinna (), Gianfranco Cicotto () and Hosein Jafarkarimi
Additional contact information
Roberta Pinna: Department of Economics and Management, University of Cagliari, 09124 Cagliari, Italy
Gianfranco Cicotto: Department of Economics, Mercatorum University, 00186 Roma, Italy
Hosein Jafarkarimi: Department of Computer, Damavand Branch, Islamic Azad University, Damavand 39715-194, Iran

Sustainability, 2023, vol. 15, issue 11, 1-20

Abstract: Universities play a significant role in the economic development of society as they provide knowledge and skills that are essential for social sustainability. In recent years, universities shifted their focus towards student-centered education and need to reconsider their sustainable strategies to become more competitive by encouraging student co-creation behaviors. To create a unique experience, universities aim to involve students in creating and delivering their educational experiences. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the perceived quality of educational service and the institutional image of a university influence students’ value co-creation behavior, and the role of loyalty in this process. The study is based on two complementary studies conducted in an Italian public university. The first study involved 720 undergraduate students with one business management bachelor’s degree who completed a questionnaire to collect primary data. The second study used six focus groups to identify which specific students’ experiences and university activities stimulated co-creation behaviors. The results show that student loyalty plays an important mediating role between university image, students’ quality perception, and co-creation behavior. Additionally, only three dimensions of quality, namely quality non-academy aspects, quality reputation, and quality access have an impact on students’ loyalty. Therefore, only two dimensions of brand image, university brand knowledge (UK), and university brand prestige (UPR) have a direct effect on value co-creation behavior. These findings have important implications for higher education institutions (HEIs) to develop managerial strategies that increase students’ co-creation behavior. The co-creation process should be considered as part of HEIs’ image-building and quality policy-enhancing strategy. Despite the value co-creation approach being overlooked in studies on HEIs governance, this study highlights its potential as a strategic approach for improving service quality and university image.

Keywords: social sustainability; higher education; students’ co-creation behavior; quality of educational services; institutional image; students’ loyalty (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/11/8920/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/15/11/8920/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:15:y:2023:i:11:p:8920-:d:1161474

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().