Transformative Service Research for Human Wellbeing: Contextual Challenges, Place-Based Framework, and SDGs

The Transformative Service Research (TSR) literature is continually expanding its scope across various academic streams. One of the key factors is prioritizing both individual and societal well-being. The purpose of this paper is to map TSR development and its alignment with United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by considering place-specificities to understand factors, barriers, and strategies that enhance individual well-being. This study employed the Systematic Literature Review (SLR) approach, adhering to PRISMA guidelines. The Scopus and Web of Science databases were utilized to scrutinize, categorize, and briefly synthesize 164 peer-reviewed journal articles, aiming to identify key domains, factors, barriers, and strategies for advancing well-being in various places and meet the Agenda 2030. The study proposes an integrated, place-sensitive framework that maps the interconnections between service entities, consumer entities, and individual well-being outcomes across urban and rural contexts. It shows that in TSR, well-being is contextually embedded: rural contexts emphasize emotional, cultural, and eudaimonic aspects of individual well-being, while urban settings prioritize the economic, social, and infrastructural dimensions. The framework advances the TSR debate by aligning TSR concepts and domains with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The findings indicate that TSR tends to prioritize certain SDGs while overlooking others, with a predominant focus on individual well-being, and this is also the case in different places. Finally, this review summarizes the key knowledge gaps into a clear and actionable future research agenda to guide research on SDGs related to service research. This research contributes to the literature by examining the key domains of TSR literature through the place-based lens and the SGDs and Agenda 2030 policy framework. It offers a novel perspective on how and whether service research contributes to the transformative power of services in diverse social contexts. This review highlights key research limitations and synthesizes these gaps into a practical future research agenda. This agenda is organized into four main categories: multilevel societal change, ensuring equity, environmental resilience, and institutional dynamics, which directly address overlooked areas in the literature. This clear roadmap provides immediate practical value by guiding researchers, policymakers, and practitioners toward targeted interventions needed to promote effective and sustainable transformative services.