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Information about the topics discussed during the 5th World Conference for Graduate Research in Tourism, Hospitality and Leisure held in Cappadocia, Turkey on May 25-30, 2010 is presented. The event was attended by graduate students from 76 institutions across the globe and presented 55 research papers and 38 extended dissertations. The topics on tourism in the presentations included job and internship satisfaction, cultural heritage, and rural tourism.

The main objective of the study was to measure hotels' service quality performance from the customer perspective. To do so, a performance-only measurement scale (SERVPERF) was administered to 234 customers stayed in three, four and five star hotels in Cappadocia. The results of the study demonstrate that SERVPERF is a reliable and valid tool to measure service quality in the hotel industry. The instrument consists of four dimensions, namely 'tangibles", "assurance-responsiveness", "empathy", and "reliability". Hotel customers are expecting more improved services from the hotels in all service quality dimensions. However, hotel customers have the lowest perception scores on tangibles. It is also revealed that empathy is the most important dimension in predicting hotel customers' overall service quality evaluation. In the light of the results, possible managerial implications are discussed and future research subjects are recommended. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]