Perceived value of local services

What is it about?

This study focus on relation between individuals’ functional status, housing arrangements and social context on the expected value of local services. The study also assess if whether the same features influence also voluntary use of services. The study also asses interaction between authorities guidance and citizens’ attitude formation in order to understand the change in rural communities.

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Why is it important?

Services provision reforms have increased the distance to services creating barriers of access in rural regions across the Europe. The trend has created a self-reinforcing negative cycle, where a decrease in local services has led to accelerated depopulation of rural regions. Changes in the rural service network's areas go hand in hand with rural-to-urban migration in the public and private sector which leads to decreasing services for rural populations. The main driver for the change is belief in economies of scale in public sector reforms and concentration of the commercial sector which leads to centralisation of operations. Similar patterns of service provision change have been recognised globally causing social inequality with regard to service availability. Recent studies have shown that citizens’ living arrangements, mobility and health-related factors influence the utilisation rate of services. Still, more understanding is needed of attitude formation with regard services amongst rural populations.

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