Abstract

ALVARADO VALENCIA, Jorge Andrés  and  TRESPALACIOS LEAL, María Carolina. UNDERSTANDING THE EVALUATION OF WAITING TIME FROM CONSUMER PSYCHOLOGY: EFFECTS OF EXPECTATIONS AND TIME FILLERS. Innovar [online]. 2016, vol.26, n.62, pp.57-68. ISSN 0121-5051.  https://doi.org/10.15446/innovar.v26n62.59388.

One of the most important factors affecting user satisfaction with a service is the evaluation of waiting time, understood as the difference between perception and expectation. Such evaluation has immediate effects on customer's satisfaction with the service of a given company. This study evaluated the effects generated by two types of time-fillers and the anchoring and adjustment heuristic in the evaluation of customer's waiting time for a low-cost service. Results indicate that users' waiting time expectations have significant effects on the perception of such time - mediated by the anchoring and adjustment heuristic - while time-fillers had no noticeable effects upon the perception or evaluation of time. In conclusion, it is suggested for companies operating in environments of self-service to consider incorporating different alternatives in the design of their service environments based on the generation of appropriate user satisfaction expectations, as a first step, and to a lesser extent consider other alternatives based on decreasing the perceived time.

Clasificación JEL: C93, L80, M11.

Keywords : Evaluation of waiting time; waiting lines; anchoring and adjustment; time-fillers; user satisfaction; time perception.

        · abstract in Spanish | Portuguese | French     · text in Spanish     · Spanish ( pdf )