Resident-defined measurement scale for a city’s products

Abstract

The concept of a city’s products has been proposed and discussed in several studies. However, customers’ quality perception is not addressed in the existing research. This study takes the perspective of city residents, follows a procedure to develop a scale, selects a few representative cities in China as study sites, and develops and tests a scale to measure the quality perceptions of a city’s products. The scale is composed of 15 dimensions: the macro environment, urban design and architectural characteristics, community infrastructure, community management and services, transportation system, leisure and recreation, shopping and dining, public events, personal career development, municipal administration and services, air quality, diligence of local government officials, social order and security, personal quality of neighborhood residents, and local corporate social responsibility. This study then examines the nomological validity by testing the relationships between the city products’ quality perception (CPQP) and citizen satisfaction, place attachment, citizen subjective well-being, and city image.