Cognitive dissonance and the stability of service quality perceptions

This paper examines the possible relationship between post‐consumption dissonance and consumers’ time‐elapsed perceptions of service quality. A review of literature suggests that the degree of post‐consumption dissonance experienced would be inversely related to both initial ratings of service quality and subsequent time‐elapsed ratings. Empirical evidence is reported of a longitudinal study of university students undergoing a first year orientation process, which confirms this proposition. The results give some tentative indication of the instability of consumer perceptions of service quality over time.