Social Media Use and Perception of Transparency in the Generation of Trust in Public Services

Public institutions are among the key agents involved in the great social and economic debate regarding satisfaction, trust and transparency. For self-funded public organizations, such as certain higher education institutions, changes in their situation (greater competition and pressure from stakeholders) have meant that the demand for transparency policies is even greater than in other types of public institution. While transparency has been observed to play a role in the generation of satisfaction and trust, the existence of disparate results in the research into this relationship has given rise to the need to analyse the role played by variables moderating this role. This paper incorporates the role of the social media (Twitter and Facebook) used to access information from an organization which, in turn, acts as an intermediary for the delivery of services by another public institution. The results indicate that while the use of Twitter does not moderate the relationship between transparency, trust and satisfaction, the frequency of Facebook use does moderate the relationship between trust and the two antecedents referred to in the model: transparency and satisfaction.