Measuring perceived quality and satisfaction of service users in social services: at heoretical and methodological analysis

Abstract

In recent years, there has been a growing interest among public authorities in understanding individuals' perceptions of the services they provide to citizens. In the field of social action, initiatives have also emerged to analyze the effectiveness and efficiency of professional interventions (Medina-Tornero and Medina-Ruiz, 2010; Arenas Martínez, 2015) and, therefore, to verify the commitment of institutions to quality and continuous improvement processes. This research aims to identify the strategies and tools commonly used to measure the satisfaction and perceived quality of the care provided to service users of Social Services in our country at the different territorial levels. To this end, a systematic review of documentary references (Fink, 2019; Rädiker and Kuckartz, 2021) linked to quality in the management and care of the Public Social Services System has been carried out, using the PRISMA method, based on users' participation experiences. The findings point to a shortage of studies on the perspective of service users in relation to the mentioned aspects, highlighting the need to establish an evaluation model in line with the principles and dimensions of a quality social intervention framework.