Understanding public transit use behavior: integration of the theory of planned behavior and the customer satisfaction theory

• Published in: Transportation (Dordrecht) Vol. 44; no. 5; pp. 1021 - 1042
• Main Authors: Fu, Xuemei, Juan, Zhicai
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: New York Springer US 01.09.2017; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Behavior change; Customer satisfaction; Decision making; Decision theory; Economic Geography; Economics; Economics and Finance; Engineering Economics; Innovation/Technology Management; Integration; Logistics; Marketing; Modal choice; Organization; Passenger satisfaction; Passengers; Public transportation; Purchase intention; Regional/Spatial Science; Theory of planned behavior; Transportation; Transportation policy; User satisfaction; Habit; Public transit use behavior; Customer satisfaction; Theory of planned behavior; Service quality
• ISSN: 0049-4488; 1572-9435
• DOI: 10.1007/s11116-016-9692-8

Understanding the motivations underlying transport mode choice is of paramount importance for interventions directed towards travel behavior change. This study presents a model of a comprehensive psychological process on individual’s public transit use decision-making, which is accomplished by the integration of the theory of planned behavior and the customer satisfaction theory. The empirical examination supports the validity of this integrated framework to model public transit use behavior, with a set of hypothesized cause-and-effect relationships among the concerned psychological constructs being confirmed. This model is expected to provide useful implications for transport policies in order to retain the current passengers as well as to attract new users in the future, e.g., how to satisfy passengers with their expected quality of public transit service.