Contradictory Criteria Research Articles

A comprehensive approach to evaluate risk mitigation strategies in offshore wind farms using spherical fuzzy decision making analysis

The escalating impact of global warming, primarily exacerbated by carbon emissions from conventional energy sources, has prompted significant advancements in offshore wind energy as a pivotal avenue for sustainable development. Amid the surging interest in renewable energy, offshore wind-farms have emerged as a promising solution. To ensure their efficient and effective operation, it becomes imperative to systematically identify and mitigate potential risks. This study addresses the critical need to systematically prioritize risk reduction strategies for offshore wind farms, a problem that has not been comprehensively explored in the literature. A multi-criteria analysis has been adopted to simultaneously evaluate the contradictory criteria in the evaluation process. The novelty of this study lies in its integration of spherical fuzzy sets with multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) techniques to handle uncertainties and evaluate contradictory criteria simultaneously. As a result of all this analysis, the most critical risks for offshore wind-farms and risk mitigation strategies that can be adopted within the determined risks have been revealed. The main findings reveal that turbine underperformance, disruption of habitats, and grid connection issues are the most critical risks. Furthermore, a combination of robust design and engineering and collaboration and partnerships emerged as the most effective risk mitigation strategies.

Sustainable and smart electric bus charging station deployment via hybrid spherical fuzzy BWM and MULTIMOORA framework

This study aims to assist public bus operators in locating electric bus charging station (EBCS) facilities from a smart and sustainable view. The selection of the most suitable EBCSs from various possible candidates involves a sophisticated decision-making procedure in terms of several contradictory criteria with imprecise information. The novelty of the study resides in exploring the EBCS site selection problem with spherical fuzzy sets (SFSs), which have shown remarkable effectiveness in limiting information loss by seizing ambiguous, and uncertain data. In this regard, a novel best–worst method (BWM) incorporating Multi-objective optimization via full multiplicative form ratio analysis (MULTIMOORA) methodology in the spherical fuzzy context is proposed to choose the optimal locations for EBCSs. The integrated framework combines the adaptability of the spherical fuzzy BWM (SF-BWM) for determining the criteria weights with the convenience of spherical fuzzy MULTIMOORA (SF-MULTIMOORA) approach for ranking the alternatives. A case study for Istanbul is provided to substantiate the propounded technique and to confirm its viability and efficiency. In the course of making a decision, a four-level hierarchical structure consisting of five main and 22 sub-criteria is built and the comparison matrices are reviewed by a panel of seven experts. A sensitivity analysis is executed, and the results demonstrate that the propositioned approach produces outcomes that are quite robust and consistent. Hence, the findings of this research can benefit public bus operators in choosing the ideal sites for electric charging stations. Finally, the formulated generic methodology is also easily applicable to diverse and complex multiple-criteria problems in the spherical fuzzy domain.

Recognizing Borderline Personality Disorder in Men: Gender Differences in BPD Symptom Presentation.

Women are predominantly diagnosed with BPD, with studies estimating a 3:1 female-to-male diagnostic ratio in clinical settings. Previous studies present conflicting findings regarding gender-level criterion differences, with some indicating differences in contradictory criteria. These studies primarily utilize outpatient samples, highlighting gaps in the literature. Thus, the current study investigates gender-level criterion differences, functioning, and impairment within a novel, partial hospital sample. Participants included (a) a sample of 1,153 individuals from the total population of partial hospital patients regardless of BPD diagnosis and (b) 365 BPD-positive patients who were assessed via semistructured clinical interview and provided consent for data collection during the intake process. Results indicated that (a) women endorsed higher relationship instability than men and (b) there were no significant differences in level of functioning across the gender subsamples. Examining gender differences in BPD symptomatology has clinical implications in improving recognition and addressing potential biases associated with men and mental health.

Evaluating and prioritizing the healthcare waste disposal center locations using a hybrid multi-criteria decision-making method

Healthcare waste disposal center location (HCWDCL) impacts the environment and the health of living beings. Different and sometimes contradictory criteria in determining the appropriate site location for disposing of healthcare waste (HCW) complicate the decision-making process. This research presents a hybrid multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) method, named PROMSIS, to determine the appropriate HCWDCL in a real case. The PROMSIS is the combination of two well-known MCDM methods, namely TOPSIS and PROMETHEE. Moreover, fuzzy theory is used to describe the uncertainties of the problem parameters. To provide a reliable decision on selecting the best HCWDCL, a comprehensive list of criteria is identified through a literature review and experts’ opinions obtained from the case study. In total, 40 criteria are identified and classified into five major criteria, namely economic, environmental, social, technical, and geological. The weight of the considered criteria is determined by the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) method. Then, the score of the alternative HCWDCLs in each considered criterion is obtained. Finally, the candidate locations for disposing of HCWs are ranked by the proposed fuzzy PROMSIS method. The results show that the most important criteria in ranking the alternatives in the studied case are economic, environmental, and social, respectively. Moreover, the sub-criteria of operating cost, transportation cost, and pollution are identified as the most important sub-criteria, respectively.

Decision Support Systems in Architecture—A Future Perspective

The benefits of design decision support systems (DDSSs) in the architectural planning context have been proven in research and are increasingly used in practice. The sense and purpose are apparent. The weighing of the most diverse ideas and approaches are required for design problems that cannot be solved unambiguously and are characterized by complex, open issues of architectural design tasks, coupled with contradictory criteria. DDSSs support planners/decision-makers with objective information to support the decision-making process with well-founded data and statements. This is becoming increasingly necessary, especially given increasingly complex construction tasks, and thus the difficult-to-predict effects of decisions. Taking this maxim into account, however, also reveals challenges in the planning context, as well as the immense potential and fields of application. Building on these issues, this article presents a perspective for DDSSs. The paper discusses the current focus and advancements of such systems, highlighting the challenges such tools still face, and provides a vision of the perspective future of these systems from reactive systems to proactive assistance.

Prioritizing healthcare waste disposal methods considering environmental health using an enhanced multi-criteria decision-making method

ABSTRACT The Healthcare Waste Disposal Method Selection (HCWDMS) is a complicated problem due to multiple and often contradictory criteria with different importance degrees. Thus, decision-makers are restored to multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) methods to prioritize and select the best HCW disposal methods. This study introduces an enhanced MCDM method to deal with the HCWDMS problem. To address the problem, a comprehensive list of criteria and HCW disposal methods are identified. All the criteria are categorized into four main criteria, and Fuzzy Analysis Hierarchy Process is used to determine the weights of considered criteria and sub-criteria. The study results show that environmental, economic, technical, and social criteria are the most important in selecting disposal methods, respectively. Moreover, the sub-criteria of ‘Health Risk’, ‘Release with health effects’, and ‘Capital cost’ have the highest importance, respectively. Additionally, the methods of ‘Microwave’, ‘Sterilization by autoclave’, and ‘Reverse polymerization’ have the highest priority, respectively.

Medical waste disposal planning for healthcare units using spherical fuzzy CRITIC-WASPAS

Healthcare services create medical waste that may be dangerous to healthcare personnel, patients, the general public, and the environment. Medical waste disposal method selection is among the most important decisions that must be made by healthcare organizations, and such a problem has a number of contradictory criteria and alternatives. On the other hand, decision experts may have considerable uncertainty while evaluating these alternatives. In this paper, new fuzzy multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) methodologies are provided for assessing the medical waste disposal alternatives. The CRiteria Importance Through Intercriteria Correlation (CRITIC) is used for obtaining criterion weights in an objective manner, and the Weighted Aggregated Sum Product ASsessment (WASPAS) approach is utilized to rank the alternatives. For modeling the uncertainty in the nature of the problem, the proposed methodology is developed in single and interval-valued spherical fuzzy environments. Single-valued spherical fuzzy sets enable users to model the membership, non-membership, and hesitancy parameters independently. On the other hand, interval-valued spherical fuzzy sets provide increased fuzziness modeling capacity. The step-by-step solution of the proposed methodologies are followed by sensitivity and comparative analyses, and a discussion. This study contributes to the work of both academics and practitioners in the healthcare industry, as well as other sectors facing similar types of decision-making problems.

Design of novel deep-UV nonlinear optical materials with one-dimensional functional module [BO2]∞ chain and fluorine-driven short phase-matching

Design of deep-ultraviolet (deep-UV) nonlinear optical (NLO) materials is urgently needed owing to the lack of high-performance crystals to meet the contradictory criteria of deep-UV transparency, strong NLO response and moderate birefringence to reach deep-UV phase-matching. In this work, a “highly-polymerized units optimizing electron delocalization” strategy was proposed to explore novel types of deep-UV NLO anionic functional module and design new materials. Two novel NLO systems with new NLO anionic functional module-one dimensional [BO2]∞ chains were successfully designed. In total, four LiBO2 (I-IV) and five Li2BO2F (I–V) structures with good thermodynamically and dynamically stable/metastable were obtained by using evolutionary algorithm crystal structure prediction techniques. All these structures contain the [BO2]∞ infinite chains and have deep-UV transparency (< 177.3 nm). LiBO2 (II, IV) and Li2BO2F (I, IV-V) exhibit large NLO response (2.0–2.3 × KH2PO4) and large birefringence (0.093–0.146 @1064 nm). Remarkably, Li2BO2F–I possesses an extremely short phase-matching wavelength about 159 nm, which is beneficial from the introduction of fluorine to maintain the superior functional module [BO2]∞ and optimize the optical properties. The results indicate that [BO2]∞ can be as a new deep-UV NLO functional module, this work provides an insight into the design of new deep-UV compound with outstanding NLO performances.

Shape optimization of tall buildings cross‐section: Balancing profit and aeroelastic performance

SummaryShape optimization is an effective tool to improve the aerodynamic performance of tall buildings by introducing minor modifications to the original project. Nevertheless, economic criteria demand efficient cross sections aiming at maximizing the building's profitability. These two contradictory criteria are commonly handled by adopting multi‐objective optimization approaches seeking the definition of Pareto fronts. However, the aerodynamic nonlinear features of low‐aspect‐ratio cross sections typically adopted in architectural practice can cause wind‐induced acceleration response surfaces over the considered design domain with multiple local minima that eventually lead to discontinuous Pareto fronts with non‐convex regions. This study delves into this problem and proposes a design framework that effectively combines the reduced basis method with multi‐objective optimization techniques to carry out the aerodynamic shape optimization using surrogates trained with CFD simulations. The ability of the optimization strategy to properly define the non‐convex regions of discontinuous Pareto fronts is successfully leveraged by adopting the weighted min–max method.

KOBİ’lerin Reklam Verme Davranışlarının Çok Kriterli Karar Verme Yöntemleri ile Analizi: Sivas Örneği

Businesses promote their products and services to consumers through advertising in order to create a desire to buy. Today, the development of technology offers businesses a wide range of advertising channel options. Choosing the most suitable advertising channel for businesses is a decision problem that requires the consideration of a large number of contradictory criteria. In this study, advertising behavior of SMEs in Sivas was examined with AHP, DEMATEL and maut methods, one of the multi-criteria decision making methods. In the study, the importance weights of the criteria affecting advertising behavior were determined by AHP and DEMATEL methods. Advertising channel selection was made for a company using MAUT method using criterion importance weights determined by AHP and DEMATEL methods. In the study, AHP and DEMATEL methods were found to be applicable methods in the choice of advertising channels along with the Maut method.

Application of a Genetic Algorithm With a Fuzzy Objective Function for Optimized Siting of Electric Vehicle Charging Devices in Urban Road Networks

Minimization of negative environmental impact of transport cannot be pursued through mobility limiting, but rather through efficient utilization of natural resources. Some of the ways to reduce harmful pollution and noise include increasing the use of electric energy for transportation and developing electromobility. However, municipalities face difficult decisions connected with the siting of charging stations, for example, budget limitations are an important factor. The presented method allows for selecting a subset of existing parking lots where the charging devices will be sited. As the inputs, only easily accessible data is required. Applying a genetic algorithm combined with fuzzy logic and the Pareto front analysis, one could establish a set of optimal solutions for multiple pre-defined restrictive and partially contradictory criteria. The method has been discussed using a real example of a medium-sized city in southern Poland. Its results have also made it possible to verify whether a budget required for the planned investment is substantiated.

Group-based Pythagorean fuzzy soft sets with medical decision-making applications

ABSTRACTThe Pythagorean fuzzy soft set is an instrument to overcome the uncertainty in the data by adding a parametrisation element. Group decision‐making is a continuum in which multiple individuals interact at the same time, resolve problems, appraise the probable existing alternatives, characterised by multiple contradictory criteria, and select an appropriate alternative solution to the problem. In this study, the generalised Pythagorean fuzzy soft set and the group-based generalised Pythagorean fuzzy soft set are defined. A group-based generalised Pythagorean fuzzy soft set is to be used in the evaluation of the object by a group of experts rather than a single expert. According to new definitions, weighted averaging and geometric aggregation operators have been given. To solve the problems in the Pythagorean fuzzy environment, the decision-making process established by considering the new soft sets and the aggregation operators obtained with these sets were presented with an algorithm. A medical example of the choice of the optimal alternative has been designed to indicate the developed decision-making process. Finally, a comparison has been made between the new method and the existing method. It is seen from the results obtained that an expert opinion does not give appropriate results at the desired rate without the generalisation parameter.

Comparison of Multi-Criteria Decision Making Methods for Multi Optimization of GTAC Process Parameters

A great deal of investigation on gas tungsten arc cladding (GTAC) is focused on the study of enhancements in the microstructure, mechanical and tribological features of the cladding. The selection of right process parameters is a critical issue for the researchers. Decision makers in the industries must analyze a wide variety of parameters based on a set of contradictory criteria. Several multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) techniques are now available to add values in selection of these parameters. The application of the TOPSIS and MOORA techniques to identify the best configuration of processing parameters in the gas tungsten arc cladding (GTAC) process is investigated in this work. The best processing parameters set for the multiple performance attributes should be welding current: 70 amp, speed: 240, argon flow: 13 and standoff distance 3.5 (TOPSIS-PCA) and welding current: 50, speed: 300, argon flow: 13 and standoff distance 3.5 (MOORA-PCA).A comparison of MOORA-PCA and TOPSIS-PCA demonstrates the superiority of TOPSIS over MOORA technique. The prediction accuracy of the TOPSIS-PCA hybrid approach model is found better than MOORA-PCA technique.

A novel MCDM model for warehouse location selection in supply chain management

The present investigation reveals a novel method for the evaluation of warehouse location for leagile supply chain entailing Fuzzy Multi Criteria Analysis (FMCA). An attempt has been made to apply the concept of decision theory for selecting the warehouse under contradictory criteria. Aggregate Modified Weighted Value (MWV) of normalized score of alternative is determined to evaluate Benefit Cost Ratio (BCR) which is considered as the warehouse selection index. The proposed algorithm is illustrated with a suitable numerical example to adjudge its desirable importance in capability and practicability. It also ensured that the achieved result clearly matches with those of previous research works. Finally, sensitivity analysis has been carried out that justify and supports the application of proposed algorithm in finding the most favorable outcome to the selection problem of warehouse location.

Solar panel selection using an integrated analytical hierarchy process and multi-objective optimisation by ratio analysis: an empirical study

A solar panel is a vital element of a photovoltaic (PV) system. Hence, it is essential to study the reduction of material costs of a solar panel without compromising the efficiency of it. Selection of solar panel is a complex problem due to the presence of various quantitative and qualitative parameters. This paper deals with the development of a mathematical model by combining analytical hierarchy process (AHP) and multi-objective optimisation by ratio analysis (MOORA) for the evaluation and ranking of solar panels. The AHP method is utilised to fix compromise solution with incommensurable and contradictory criteria, consisting of five potential solar panels and eight selection parameters. The AHP technique is adopted for calculating the criteria weights based on the relative importance. Consequently, MOORA method is used for ranking and selecting the solar panel alternatives. The proposed AHP and MOORA approach is found to be effective for the evaluation and ranking of solar panels as it produces comparable results with VIKOR method. In the VIKOR method, alternatives are ranked based on closeness to positive ideal solution.

Financial performance index of IPO firms using VIKOR-CRITIC techniques

Investments in IPO markets are becoming increasingly complex because of the uncertain information and contradictory criteria that needs to be considered during the decision-making process. The main aim of this paper is to apply the Multi-Criteria Decision-Making Technique (MCDM) in order to improve the quality of the financial decision-making process and the quality of the resulting choices. This paper empirically evaluates the performance of IPO firms listed on the Saudi Stock Market using the accounting and value-based financial measures in ‘pre- and post-IPO period’, ranking them using the combined approach of objective weighting method (CRITIC) and the multi-criteria decision-making technique (VIKOR). The ranking list generated through the VIKOR_CRITIC approach will enable investors to identify the best ranked IPO firms and also allow them to make inter-firm comparisons based on the important representative measures drawn from a complex set of financial performance criterion. The combined VIKOR_CRITIC approach used in this study yielded favorable results and it ranked Saudi Airlines Catering Co., Saudi Co. for Hardware and Saudi Ground Services as the best performing IPO firms.

Machine Selection for a Textile Company with CRITIC and MAUT Methods

The main purpose of the companies is to make a profit and to ensure that this profitability is continuous. In this context, the selection of the machines used by the companies in production is an important issue. Businesses have to choose the most suitable machine to reduce their costs and produce efficiently. For this reason, the decision of machine selection is also very important for textile enterprises. Machine selection in textile enterprises is a Multi-Criteria Decision problem in which a large number and contradictory criteria are taken into account. In this study, machine selection will be made with CRITIC and MAUT methods for a textile company. In the study, the weights of the decision criteria that are effective in the decision-making were determined by the CRITIC method. Then, the machine selection was made by evaluating the alternatives with the MAUT method. According to the results of the study, CRITIC and MAUT methods were evaluated as integrally applicable to machine selection.

Multi-Criteria Decision Making of Sustainable Adaptive Reuse of Heritage Buildings Based on the A'WOT Analysis: A Case Study of Cordahi Complex, Alexandria, Egypt

This study presents a multi-criteria strategic approach of decision-making in sustainable adaptive reuse by evaluating cultural heritage assets and identifying potential alternatives. For effective preservation, adaptive reuse of heritage buildings is a strategic decision. Whereas adaptive reuse decisions are based on several, sometimes contradictory criteria, in addition to decisions from multiple parties and stakeholders are potentially inconsistent. This research finds that the reuse process should consider many important criteria to expand and enhance the knowledge base. This paper presents a systematic application and analytical method in decision-making for adaptive reuse of heritage Cordahi complex in Alexandria, Egypt. The A'WOT analysis application was used as an analytical tool to obtain results through the integration of a SWOT matrix and an Analytical Hierarchy (AHP) process. The SWOT technique was used to examine the internal and external factors and identify the important strategic factors, then apply the AHP method to prioritize these factors to make them measurable. Then, SWOT priority factors were used to formulate strategies using the TOWS Matrix. The proposed strategy relates to protecting and promoting the importance of heritage and the context, enhance the tourism potential, economic development for the population, interpretation strategy, community engagement, sustainable management, partnerships.

Skyline refinement exploiting fuzzy formal concept analysis

PurposeThe study of the skyline queries has received considerable attention from several database researchers since the end of 2000's. Skyline queries are an appropriate tool that can help users to make intelligent decisions in the presence of multidimensional data when different, and often contradictory criteria are to be taken into account. Based on the concept of Pareto dominance, the skyline process extracts the most interesting (not dominated in the sense of Pareto) objects from a set of data. Skyline computation methods often lead to a set with a large size which is less informative for the end users and not easy to be exploited. The purpose of this paper is to tackle this problem, known as the large size skyline problem, and propose a solution to deal with it by applying an appropriate refining process.Design/methodology/approachThe problem of the skyline refinement is formalized in the fuzzy formal concept analysis setting. Then, an ideal fuzzy formal concept is computed in the sense of some particular defined criteria. By leveraging the elements of this ideal concept, one can reduce the size of the computed Skyline.FindingsAn appropriate and rational solution is discussed for the problem of interest. Then, a tool, named SkyRef, is developed. Rich experiments are done using this tool on both synthetic and real datasets.Research limitations/implicationsThe authors have conducted experiments on synthetic and some real datasets to show the effectiveness of the proposed approaches. However, thorough experiments on large-scale real datasets are highly desirable to show the behavior of the tool with respect to the performance and time execution criteria.Practical implicationsThe tool developed SkyRef can have many domains applications that require decision-making, personalized recommendation and where the size of skyline has to be reduced. In particular, SkyRef can be used in several real-world applications such as economic, security, medicine and services.Social implicationsThis work can be expected in all domains that require decision-making like hotel finder, restaurant recommender, recruitment of candidates, etc.Originality/valueThis study mixes two research fields artificial intelligence (i.e. formal concept analysis) and databases (i.e. skyline queries). The key elements of the solution proposed for the skyline refinement problem are borrowed from the fuzzy formal concept analysis which makes it clearer and rational, semantically speaking. On the other hand, this study opens the door for using the formal concept analysis and its extensions in solving other issues related to skyline queries, such as relaxation.

Layout of the First-Mining Working Face in the Protected Seam for Pressure Relief by Peak Stress Shift

An appropriate layout of the first-mining working face of protected seams is key to rockburst prevention in coal seams. By taking the first-mining working face in the 2-2# middle coal seam in Hulusu Coal Mine as the background, a mechanical model for the stress distribution after mining the upper protective seams was established through theoretical analysis and in situ measurement. The problem concerning the layout of the first-mining working face in the protected seam was transformed into one concerning the optimal horizontal distance L. Furthermore, based on the theory of stress transfer within a semi-infinite plane, the distribution of the vertical stress in the protected seam was deduced, for which numerical simulation was performed. Through calculation, it is best (in terms of roadway excavation) to set L to between 50 and 75 m; the mining-induced disturbance shows the least influence on the two roadways at L = 80 to 140 m and at L = 40 to 100 m, and the influence of the remaining coal pillar on mining of the working face is the least significant. Based on the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) evaluation method, the weights of three groups of contradictory criteria and the weighted values of the peak stress under different values of L were calculated. The results show that the global stress on the first-mining working face in the protected seams is lowest at L = 60 m. The results can provide a reference for the layout of the working faces in protected seams in adjacent coal mines.