3,634 research outputs found

    Modelling, Monitoring, Control and Optimization for Complex Industrial Processes

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    This reprint includes 22 research papers and an editorial, collected from the Special Issue "Modelling, Monitoring, Control and Optimization for Complex Industrial Processes", highlighting recent research advances and emerging research directions in complex industrial processes. This reprint aims to promote the research field and benefit the readers from both academic communities and industrial sectors

    Towards a framework for the study of ongoing socio-technical transitions: explored through the UK self-driving car paradigm

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    The UK government set out to see self-driving cars on roads by 2021. The idea of a self-driving car has been around for almost a century, and more recent technological developments have made self-driving cars a real-life possibility. While a fully self-driving automobility system is some distance away, real-life testing is bringing autonomous driving closer to consumers. Some claim this to be the biggest disruption to mobility systems since the invention of the car. Claims about the potential of self-driving mobility range from economic and social benefits to environmental improvements. A significant ambiguity however remains concerning how they will be deployed and how the technological innovation will affect mobility aims and related transport and infrastructure systems. So far, the vast majority of studies on AVs have focused on the technology aspect of this transition lacking contributions that address this from a broader socio-technical perspective. With the accelerated adoption of new technologies, Sustainability Transitions has come to prominence as a research area that seeks to understand and guide socio-technical transitions toward sustainable trajectories. Socio-technical transitions theoretical framework has been used to understand historical transitions in the majority of empirical applications. The ability to apply the same framework to ongoing transitions and to guide these towards sustainable outcomes remains unsubstantiated. To address this gap this thesis examines the foundations of multi-level perspective (MLP) – a socio-technical transitions analytical framework – and develops an analytical framework (SRPM – System Rules Pathways Mechanisms) that is appropriate for the study of ongoing transitions. The refocused framework incorporates critical realism to focus analysis on causation and causal mechanisms. It is used to analyse the ongoing socio-technical transition to self-driving cars in the UK through a four-step analytical process. The study is framed as a case-based process mechanism study. The four steps are: i) contextualisation of the ongoing transition to AVs in the UK as a socio-technical transition based on the MLP theoretical framework; ii) identification of internal and external structural relations within the transition through the notion of rules and the morphogenetic cycle; iii) aligning observed processes with transition pathways to theorise about the trajectories of the transition; iv) identification of causal mechanisms in the observed processes through identification of demi-regularities through data analysis of grey literature and theorisation about mechanisms through the development of mechanism sketches and schemata. The thesis makes two contributions to knowledge: i) methodological and ii) empirical. The methodological contribution is the development of the SRPM analytical framework to study an ongoing socio-technical transition, and the empirical contribution is the application of this framework to the study of the ongoing transition to driverless cars in the UK

    Dropout, persistence, and retention on online higher education: The case of the Open University of Catalonia

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    This doctoral thesis focuses on student dropout in online higher education (OHE), with a focus on the experience of students and faculty at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC). The thesis is presented as a compendium of six publications that address issues related to dropout, persistence and retention in OHE. A qualitative and exploratory descriptive research design is used that includes in-depth open interviews and qualitative content analysis. The findings highlight the importance of the first year for dropout and persistence, with time-related factors being the main barriers to persistence and reasons for dropout. In addition, persistent students presented different characteristics and dynamics compared to students who dropped out. Various theoretical and practical implications derived from the integrated findings are discussed, including a series of practical recommendations and possible interventions.Esta tesis doctoral se centra en el abandono de estudiantes en la educación superior en línea (ESL), con un enfoque en la experiencia de los estudiantes y profesores en la Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC). La tesis se presenta como un compendio de seis publicaciones que abordan temas relacionados con el abandono, la persistencia y la retención en la ESL. Se utiliza un diseño de investigación cualitativo y exploratorio-descriptivo que incluye entrevistas abiertas en profundidad y análisis de contenido cualitativo. Los hallazgos destacan la importancia del primer año para el abandono y la persistencia, con factores relacionados con el tiempo como las principales barreras para la persistencia y razones para el abandono. Además, los estudiantes persistentes presentan características y dinámicas distintas en comparación con los estudiantes que abandonan. Se discuten varias implicaciones teóricas y prácticas derivadas de los hallazgos integrados, incluyendo una serie de recomendaciones prácticas y posibles intervenciones.Aquesta tesi doctoral se centra en l'abandó d'estudiants a l'educació superior en línia (ESL), amb un enfocament a l'experiència dels estudiants i professors a la Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC). La tesi es presenta com un compendi de sis publicacions que aborden temes relacionats amb l'abandó, la persistència i la retenció a l'ESL. S'utilitza un disseny de recerca qualitatiu i exploratori-descriptiu que inclou entrevistes obertes en profunditat i anàlisi de contingut qualitatiu. Els resultats destaquen la importància del primer any per a l'abandó i la persistència, amb factors relacionats amb el temps com les barreres principals per a la persistència i raons per a l'abandó. A més, els estudiants persistents presenten característiques i dinàmiques diferents en comparació amb els estudiants que abandonen. Es discuteixen diverses implicacions teòriques i pràctiques derivades dels resultats integrats, incloent-hi una sèrie de recomanacions pràctiques i possibles intervencions.e-learnin

    Optimising urban environments to promote active and healthy ageing using a citizen science approach

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    As urbanization and population ageing continue to simultaneously occur, considering the ways in which urban environments can be optimised to support older adults and promote their active and healthy ageing is crucial. Across the public health and age-friendly cities (AFC) literature, it has become clear that actively engaging older adults in their local urban contexts can contribute to this, embedding their local-level and place-based needs within urban initiatives. The aim of this thesis was to engage older adults and community stakeholders through a citizen science (CS) approach in order to explore how urban environments can be optimised to promote active and healthy ageing. To inform the CS approach, a systematic scoping review was undertaken and identified urban barriers and facilitators across the global context of public health literature engaging older adults in urban environments. This review elucidated further areas across neighbourhood changes and migrant and cross-cultural communities that require extension within the age-friendly agenda. The Citizen Science Appraisal Tool (CSAT) was also developed as part of the systematic scoping review. The CSAT demonstrated ways in which CS best practices can be utilised within CS research to actively engage older adults and develop good quality CS research for public health. The CS study followed, employing four stages with older adults (N = 17; Mean Age = 72.4 (SD 7.5); Female = 11) and community stakeholders (N = 22; Female = 13). This study included a preliminary citizen social science (CSS) study, bringing together older adults community stakeholders in online discussions. The outcomes of this stage presented a collective social framing of active and healthy ageing, alongside organic connections, solution-building and potential network-building emerging. The following three stages of the CS study, informed by the Our Voice CS for health equity approach, engaged older adults to collect and interpret their own data. This included Discovery Tool walks and discussion groups, followed by advocating their findings to community stakeholders during workshops. The outcomes presented contributions to the age-friendly, public health and urban planning literature through six co-produced city-wide recommendations for optimising physical social elements across the city of Birmingham. Encompassing these recommendations in a social-ecological systems (SES) approach demonstrated their interconnectedness across different urban social-ecological domains. The SES approach demonstrated the value for bringing these urban recommendations, domains and disciplines together through a ‘whole’ systems view to effectively implement age-friendly changes. An implementation framework for actioning the age-friendly agenda across the city of Birmingham was also developed. This framework identified how bottom-up and top-down approaches can centre on collaborative actions, presenting a middle ground that brings together older adults needs with the resources and support of stakeholders. This framework presents a transferable tool that can be utilised across other studies strengthening the age-friendly agenda. Overall, this thesis presents a demonstratable case of actively engaging older adults and community stakeholders through CSS and CS to understand their experiences and place-based needs in urban environments. This included embedding the voice of older adults into co-produced recommendations for optimising urban environments, having potential to maximise the impact of urban initiatives that target active and healthy ageing. This in turn addresses the current challenge that decision-makers face when trying to understand the determinants to alter or enhance in urban environments when promoting active and healthy ageing

    Embodying entrepreneurship: everyday practices, processes and routines in a technology incubator

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    The growing interest in the processes and practices of entrepreneurship has been dominated by a consideration of temporality. Through a thirty-six-month ethnography of a technology incubator, this thesis contributes to extant understanding by exploring the effect of space. The first paper explores how class structures from the surrounding city have appropriated entrepreneurship within the incubator. The second paper adopts a more explicitly spatial analysis to reveal how the use of space influences a common understanding of entrepreneurship. The final paper looks more closely at the entrepreneurs within the incubator and how they use visual symbols to develop their identity. Taken together, the three papers reject the notion of entrepreneurship as a primarily economic endeavour as articulated through commonly understood language and propose entrepreneuring as an enigmatic attractor that is accessed through the ambiguity of the non-verbal to develop the ‘new’. The thesis therefore contributes to the understanding of entrepreneurship and proposes a distinct role for the non-verbal in that understanding

    In Defence of Social Justice:A Qualitative Study on an Intergroup Dialogue Programme in American Higher Education

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    The continuous struggle for equity in American culture and the recent racial tensions on university campuses across the United States prompt further exploration into innovative initiatives that maximise the educational benefits of diversity in higher education. Intergroup dialogue (IGD) has gained recognition as a transformative social justice education practice that focuses on issues of diversity and inequality while employing critical, democratic pedagogies. This qualitative study examines the extent dialogue across identity differences can be used in higher education to motivate awareness about and actions in defence of social justice. Freire’s (1970, 1974) critical pedagogy framework is combined with Pettigrew’s (1998) intergroup contact theory to provide theoretical context for examining the complex learning experiences and outcomes of intergroup dialogue. This theoretical framework positions the examination of intergroup dialogue as a social justice praxis versus intergroup dialogue as an individual intervention with intergroup harmony as its objective. The study uses qualitative data from focus groups with voluntary participants from a convenience sample of students who enrolled in an intergroup dialogue class at a US-based university (anonymised as USU in this thesis) in the autumn semester 2017. The study found that IGD shows promising results on the individual level, facilitating deeper awareness and understanding of social injustice, but does not seem to have an influence on supporting social justice at the institutional and systemic levels

    The Future of Work and Digital Skills

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    The theme for the events was "The Future of Work and Digital Skills". The 4IR caused a hollowing out of middle-income jobs (Frey & Osborne, 2017) but COVID-19 exposed the digital gap as survival depended mainly on digital infrastructure and connectivity. Almost overnight, organizations that had not invested in a digital strategy suddenly realized the need for such a strategy and the associated digital skills. The effects have been profound for those who struggled to adapt, while those who stepped up have reaped quite the reward.Therefore, there are no longer certainties about what the world will look like in a few years from now. However, there are certain ways to anticipate the changes that are occurring and plan on how to continually adapt to an increasingly changing world. Certain jobs will soon be lost and will not come back; other new jobs will however be created. Using data science and other predictive sciences, it is possible to anticipate, to the extent possible, the rate at which certain jobs will be replaced and new jobs created in different industries. Accordingly, the collocated events sought to bring together government, international organizations, academia, industry, organized labour and civil society to deliberate on how these changes are occurring in South Africa, how fast they are occurring and what needs to change in order to prepare society for the changes.Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) British High Commission (BHC)School of Computin

    Z-Numbers-Based Approach to Hotel Service Quality Assessment

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    In this study, we are analyzing the possibility of using Z-numbers for measuring the service quality and decision-making for quality improvement in the hotel industry. Techniques used for these purposes are based on consumer evalu- ations - expectations and perceptions. As a rule, these evaluations are expressed in crisp numbers (Likert scale) or fuzzy estimates. However, descriptions of the respondent opinions based on crisp or fuzzy numbers formalism not in all cases are relevant. The existing methods do not take into account the degree of con- fidence of respondents in their assessments. A fuzzy approach better describes the uncertainties associated with human perceptions and expectations. Linguis- tic values are more acceptable than crisp numbers. To consider the subjective natures of both service quality estimates and confidence degree in them, the two- component Z-numbers Z = (A, B) were used. Z-numbers express more adequately the opinion of consumers. The proposed and computationally efficient approach (Z-SERVQUAL, Z-IPA) allows to determine the quality of services and iden- tify the factors that required improvement and the areas for further development. The suggested method was applied to evaluate the service quality in small and medium-sized hotels in Turkey and Azerbaijan, illustrated by the example
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