The moderating role of personality traits in the effect of the perceived service quality on customer satisfaction in hospitality establishments

This study aims to investigate the influence of personality traits of hospitality customers on service quality and customer satisfaction. To this end, in addition to the influence of personality traits on the level of value attached to the service quality dimensions and satisfaction; the moderating role of personality traits in influencing service quality perceptions on customer satisfaction has also been investigated. The study comprises five chapters. The first chapter outlines the purpose, importance, assumptions, constraints and research problem. The second chapter provides a review of the literature and explains the basic concepts relating to the variables investigated in the study. The third chapter presents the research model, the hypotheses in the study, the population, the sampling process, the questionnaire and the pre-test results. The fourth chapter explains the findings of the study. The findings are based on the data obtained from 517 customers who had a hospitality service experience at hotels in the Aegean Region. The SPSS 23, Process v3.5 and AMOS 21 programs were used in the analysis of data and the correlation, simple and multiple linear regression and structural equation modeling were applied. The fifth part of the study provides an evaluation of the hypothesis tests. It also compares and discusses the findings the study in the light of the literature and offers recommendations for the researchers and the practitioners. The research has found that perceived service quality influences customer satisfaction positively, while neuroticism as a personality trait appeared to have a moderating effect between service quality and customer satisfaction. Also, it was found that introverts paid more attention to the tangibles dimension of service quality, while extroverts paid more attention to the responsiveness and assurance dimensions. Additionally, people with agreeableness personality trait paid more attention to the empathy dimension, while people who scored low on aggreablenes paid more attention to the responsiveness dimension.