Penalty-Reward Analysis with Uninorms: A Study of Customer (Dis)Satisfaction

Abstract

In customer (dis)satisfaction research, analytic methods are needed to capture the complex relationship between overall (dis)satisfaction with a product or service and the underlying (perceived) performance on the product’s or service’s attributes. Eventually, the method should allow to identify the attributes that need improvement and that most significantly enhance the business relationship with the customer. This paper presents an analytic design based on uninorms, which is able to capture the nature of the relationship between attribute-level (dis)satisfaction and overall (dis)satisfaction in the context of different attributes. In contrast to alternative statistical approaches, ours allows for full reinforcement and compensation in the satisfaction model without a priori defining the formal role of each attribute. Impact curves visualize the relationships between attribute-level (dis)satisfaction and overall satisfaction. Penalty-reward analysis on the basis of uninorms is illustrated on a satisfaction study of an energy supply firm. The analysis confirms the three-factor structure of (dis)satisfaction. The interpretation of the impact curves allow managers optimizing their attribute scores in order to maximize customer (dis)satisfaction.