Abstract
This article introduces the importance of equivalence framing for understanding how satisfaction measures affect citizens’ evaluation of public services. Does a 90 percent satisfaction rate have a different effect than a logically equivalent 10 percent dissatisfaction rate? Two experiments were conducted on citizens’ evaluations of hospital services in a large, nationally representative sample of Danish citizens. Both experiments found that exposing citizens to a patient dissatisfaction measure led to more negative views of public service than exposing them to a logically equivalent satisfaction metric. There is some support for part of the shift in evaluations being caused by a negativity bias: dissatisfaction has a larger negative impact than satisfaction has a positive impact. Both professional experience at a hospital and prior exposure to satisfaction rates reduced the negative response to dissatisfaction rates. The results call for further study of equivalence framing of performance information.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Journal | Public Administration Review |
| Volume | 75 |
| Issue number | 3 |
| Pages (from-to) | 469-478 |
| Number of pages | 10 |
| ISSN | 0033-3352 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 1 May 2015 |
Keywords
- Faculty of Social Sciences
- performance indicators
- Experimental design
- performance management
- satisfaction
- behavioral public administration