Measuring and assessing the quality of library services is an integral part of the managerial approach to libraries (Solimine). As a consequence, where a patron-driven approach is more rooted and library is conceived as a social institution (Traniello) and managed as a complex organisation, the need to adopt assessing tools in order to explicit the results gained by library services was felt earlier and more intensely. In recent times, the mainly quantitative approach has turned to a properly

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... alitative one and tools like interviews and focus groups have been adopted to let patrons' expectations and perceptions about libraries and their services coming out (Pickard; Faggiolani). As a consequence of using the methods of the social sciences (Bryman; Corbetta) and moving from the relative objectivity of quantitative data to the substantial subjectivity of opinions, the level of complexity of evaluation has grown, as well as the capacity to understand the phenomena which affect the library life. Under this