A great deal of effort has been aimed at clarifying consumer behavior in the service industry. It seems, however, to be insufficient to apply service-marketing theories built by previous studies to a specific service industry, and clarify differences of consumerr behavior between service categories. Referring to the existing service marketing theories, this study investigates the expectations of customers toward vocational education services and how those expectations affect customers' choice of school type. It also analyzes structures of perceived quality in vocational education service. The empirical analyses show that to gain valuable connections, as welll as skills concerning the vocation, a more attractive vocational environment promotes the willingness to use vocational education services. Also, the structure of perceived service quality in vocational education services is not identical to ones shown in previous research.

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In this article, the author investigates the effects of cooperative advertising from a consumer's perspective according to the theoretical framework developed by Samu, Krishnan, and Smith (1999). The author identifies compatibility of the usage occasion, type of ad processing strategy (Top-Down versus Bottom-Up advertising), and type of differentiation strategy (POP versus POD advertising) as important factors in determining ad effectiveness. The conceptualization captures the effects of these factors on brand awareness and brand belief. Several hypotheses are induced based on variables above and tested in an experiment.

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[in Japanese]

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