Application of social exchange theory on relationship marketing dynamism from higher education service destination loyalty perspective

The recent paradigm shift from recruitment of international students to retention of students encouraged radical changes on the consumption of educational services from university serving the students for creation of mutually beneficial relationship between the students and the university. The impact of globalization hit the economy in two paradoxes; first, consumers have more choices but less satisfaction; second, service providers have more strategic options, which yield less value. Against this background, this study proposed and validated destination loyalty model to arrest the increasing students’ attrition at study location. The declining state funding of higher education challenged the management of education sector to design sustainable competitive advantage strategy not only to attract but also to retain students at their study destination. A total of 498 data was solicited from international students at Malaysian public universities, partial least square structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was used to test the reliability and validity of items and constructs. The results show that relationship marketing dynamism of service quality, students’ satisfaction, perceive image, perceived value and personal reasons were stable for international student loyalty to study destination. A new model called 2S2P was developed for emerging education destinations. Theoretical and practical implications as well as directions for future studies were documented in the paper.