Layered evaluation of interactive adaptive systems : framework and formative methods

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Proceedings of Abstracts Engineering and Computer Science Research Conference 2019

© 2019 The Author(s). This is an open-access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. For further details please see https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. Note: Keynote: Fluorescence visualisation to evaluate effectiveness of personal protective equipment for infection control is © 2019 Crown copyright and so is licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Under this licence users are permitted to copy, publish, distribute and transmit the Information; adapt the Information; exploit the Information commercially and non-commercially for example, by combining it with other Information, or by including it in your own product or application. Where you do any of the above you must acknowledge the source of the Information in your product or application by including or linking to any attribution statement specified by the Information Provider(s) and, where possible, provide a link to this licence: http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/This book is the record of abstracts submitted and accepted for presentation at the Inaugural Engineering and Computer Science Research Conference held 17th April 2019 at the University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, UK. This conference is a local event aiming at bringing together the research students, staff and eminent external guests to celebrate Engineering and Computer Science Research at the University of Hertfordshire. The ECS Research Conference aims to showcase the broad landscape of research taking place in the School of Engineering and Computer Science. The 2019 conference was articulated around three topical cross-disciplinary themes: Make and Preserve the Future; Connect the People and Cities; and Protect and Care

Adaptive Multidimensional Scaling: The Spatial Representation of Brand Consideration and Dissimilarity Judgments

We propose Adaptive Multidimensional Scaling (AMDS) for simultaneously deriving a brand map and market segments using consumer data on cognitive decision sets and brand dissimilarities.In AMDS, the judgment task is adapted to the individual respondent: dissimilarity judgments are collected only for those brands within a consumers' awareness set.Thus, respondent fatigue and subjects' unfamiliarity with any subset of the brands are circumvented; thereby improving the validity of the dissimilarity data obtained, as well as the multidimensional spatial structure derived.Estimation of the AMDS model results in a spatial map in which the brands and derived segments of consumers are jointly represented as points.The closer a brand is positioned to a segment's ideal brand, the higher the probability that the brand is considered and chosen.An assumption underlying this model representation is that brands within a consumers' consideration set are relatively similar.In an experiment with 200 subjects and 4 product categories, this assumption is validated.We illustrate adaptive multidimensional scaling on commercial data for 20 midsize car brands evaluated by 212 members of a consumer panel.Potential applications of the method and future research opportunities are discussed.scaling;brands;market segmentation

An Adaptive Conjoint Analysis of Freight Service Alternatives: Evaluating the Maritime Alternative

The growing interest towards a re-balancing of freight traffic over the different modes, has brought renewed focus on the "Motorways of the sea" as they have been defined by the EU Commission in the recently issued White paper (2001). These could constitute a valid alternative to land transport over medium-long distance, favouring, at the same time, a greater integration among different modes. However, the great potential of this alternative - which is increasingly capturing the interest of policymakers - should be evaluated also in the light of the level of competitiveness nowadays required by the operators. The latter, in fact, need a flexible transport system capable of adapting to the modern system of production and completely integrated within the logistics networks (both existing and under construction). Furthermore, in order to effectively promote the use of this alternative, it is necessary to undertake a number of initiatives directed mainly at reducing the bottlenecks currently present within the ports and in the links between ports and their interland. In determining the necessary investments in intermodal sea-land infrastructures it is essential to evaluate the dimension and the extent of the potential re-orientation of traffic flows towards maritime transport which would yield insight on the appropriate/optimal dimension of such investments. In order to achieve this, it would be essential to have a set of information not only on the current movements but also on their potential reallocation. An estimation of the latter cannot be achieved without an in-depth analysis of shippers behaviour. However, while in the last year a number of documents have been put forward on the great opportunities offered by the development of the "Motorways of the sea" in re-directing freight flows, there is a lack of any empirical analysis on the determinants of such choice by operators. In other words, a lot has been done in analysing supply while very little in analysing demand. In this work we aim to identify the value that the user assigns to the specific transport alternative and the factors - related to both the mode and the specific organisation of the companies - that exert a significant influence on the choice of the shipper. These elements represent a necessary prerequisite for any previsions. The methodology used falls within the definition of conjoint Analysis. We will measure the trade-offs users of freight transport services make in choosing between alternative modes. We will also use the result to predict their choices with regards to alternatives which, at the moment might not be present, but which might be placed on the market. The assumption we make, following the approach of Bolis and Maggi (1999) and Fowkes and Tweddle (1996), is that the transport service can be ?broken down? into its component attributes. As it is well known, conjoint analysis allows to determine the value that individuals place on any product as equivalent to the sum of the utility they derive from all the attributes making up a product. In particular, given the successful applications to land transport, we use "Adaptive Stated Preferences" (ASP) techniques adjusted in order to carry out the analysis of freight transport demand in the maritime context. We aim to evaluate the preferences of operators in terms of service attributes of sea transport. Given the purposes of this study, for the moment we focus the empirical application on a specific geographical context. In particular, we analyse the preferences of operators localised in the north-west regions of Italy with respect to the possibility of accessing a maritime ro-ro service from the ports of Genoa or La Spezia. The analysis is carried out in two phases: a postal survey and a subsequent direct interview. The latter is done creating a ?transport experiment? and recording the behaviour and the choices of the interviewed. Following this approach, we obtain an accurate estimation of operators? willingness to pay for the specific service characteristics (hard output) and we induce them to reveal the rank of their preferences for a set of potential new services (soft output). In the first part of the paper we give details of the specific transport options we are considering and we describe the project carried out, in the second part we illustrate the methodology used the and the necessary modification we have had to carry out in order to implement the study in a maritime context. In the third part we discuss the data collection process and we carry out a preliminary data analysis, while, in the fourth section, we present the results of the econometric model (logit model) used to analyse the data and we give some interpretation. Finally, in the last section, we present some concluding remarks.

User-centred design of flexible hypermedia for a mobile guide: Reflections on the hyperaudio experience

A user-centred design approach involves end-users from the very beginning. Considering users at the early stages compels designers to think in terms of utility and usability and helps develop the system on what is actually needed. This paper discusses the case of HyperAudio, a context-sensitive adaptive and mobile guide to museums developed in the late 90s. User requirements were collected via a survey to understand visitors’ profiles and visit styles in Natural Science museums. The knowledge acquired supported the specification of system requirements, helping defining user model, data structure and adaptive behaviour of the system. User requirements guided the design decisions on what could be implemented by using simple adaptable triggers and what instead needed more sophisticated adaptive techniques, a fundamental choice when all the computation must be done on a PDA. Graphical and interactive environments for developing and testing complex adaptive systems are discussed as a further step towards an iterative design that considers the user interaction a central point. The paper discusses how such an environment allows designers and developers to experiment with different system’s behaviours and to widely test it under realistic conditions by simulation of the actual context evolving over time. The understanding gained in HyperAudio is then considered in the perspective of the developments that followed that first experience: our findings seem still valid despite the passed time

Channel strategy adaptation

Using transaction cost theory, considerable research in marketing has focused on the conditions under which firms would use direct or vertically integrated versus indirect or arms length channels of distribution. Data from the field, however, indicate that channel configurations are more varied and complex, with multiple channels and composite channels being just as common as direct and indirect channels. In an attempt to explain this variety, this paper revisits the influence on channel structure of another contending variable, namely environmental complexity. We explore the role and influence of its two components, namely volatility (stability) and heterogeneity (homogeneity). Our study of 139 firms in the healthcare industry reveals that firms facing highly volatile and customer concentrated environments tend to use direct channels, and firms facing highly stable and heterogeneous environments tend to use distribution channels. Intermediate forms such as composite channels and multiple channels were favored by firms facing combinations of the environment where the intensity of one component was high and the other low. In general, firms seem to first choose a business strategy to address their external environment, and then choose a channel strategy to support that business strategy. Firms did not always adapt by making structural changes. Under certain conditions, they simply reallocated channel functions within the same structure, thus virtually deriving all the benefits of a new structure without having to create one.marketing; channels of distribution;