The role of youths’ perceived information literacy in their assessment of youth information and counselling services

Introduction. This paper presents empirical research on whether young people’s perceived information literacy influences their perceived service quality of a youth information and counselling agency. Method. An online survey was distributed and 3,287 responses of young people between fifteen and twenty-nine years old were collected from sixteen different countries across Europe. The survey questionnaire was pre-tested by five academic experts in the field, and by youth information service workers. The SERVQUAL model including constructs (access, reliability, and responsiveness) was used to devise a theory-based conceptual model. Additionally, we used perceived information literacy as an antecedent construct in our model. Analysis. We applied structural equation modelling to investigate the effect of perceived information literacy and constructs of the SERVQUAL model on perceived service quality. Results. The results of analysis show that perceived information literacy has a strong influence on perceived ease of access, perceived reliability, and perceived responsiveness, and through these constructs has an indirect effect on perceived service quality. Conclusions. Results show a clear alignment with existing literature in the areas of youth perceived information literacy and information services. The proposed framework contributes to the scholarly discussion on youth information services and youth perceived information literacy.