Using experiments and expert judgment to model catchability of Pacific rockfishes in trawl surveys, with application to bocaccio (Sebastes paucispinis) off British Columbia

The time series of abundance indices for many groundfish populations, as determined from trawl surveys, are often imprecise and short, causing stock assessment estimates of abundance to be imprecise. To improve precision, prior probability distributions (priors) have been developed for parameters in stock assessment models by using meta-analysis, expert judgment on catchability, and empirically based modeling. This article presents a synthetic approach for formulating priors for rockfish trawl survey catchability (qgross). A multivariate prior for qgross for different surveys is formulated by using 1) a correction factor for bias in estimating fish density between trawlable and untrawlable areas, 2) expert judgment on trawl net catchability, 3) observations from trawl survey experiments, and 4) data on the fraction of population biomass in each of the areas surveyed. The method is illustrated by using bocaccio (Sebastes paucipinis) in British Columbia. Results indicate that expert judgment can be updated markedly by observing the catch-rate ratio from different trawl gears in the same areas. The marginal priors for qgross are consistent with empirical estimates obtained by fitting a stock assessment model to the survey data under a noninformative prior for qgross. Despite high prior uncertainty (prior coefficients of variation ≥0.8) and high prior correlation between qgross, the prior for qgross still enhances the precision of key stock assessment quantities

Climate Change Uncertainty Quantification: Lessons Learned from the Joint EU-USNRC Project on Uncertainty Analysis of Probabilistic Accident Consequence Codes

Between 1990 and 2000 the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Commission of the European Communities conducted a joint uncertainty analysis of accident consequences for nuclear power plants. This study remains a benchmark for uncertainty analysis of large models involving high risks with high public visibility, and where substantial uncertainty exists. The study set standards with regard to structured expert judgment, performance assessment, dependence elicitation and modeling and uncertainty propagation of high dimensional distributions with complex dependence. The integrated assessment models for the economic effects of climate change also involve high risks and large uncertainties, and interest in conducting a proper uncertainty analysis is growing. This article reviews the EU-USNRC effort and extracts lessons learned, with a view toward informing a comparable effort for the economic effects of climate change.uncertainty analysis, expert judgment, expert elicitation, probabilistic inversion, dependence modeling, nuclear safety

Evaluating Future Dangerousness and Need for Treatment: The Roles of Expert Testimony, Attributional Complexity, and Victim Type

In the current study, we explored the effect of risk-assessment testimony, attributional complexity, and victim type on participants’ perceptions of the dangerousness of a sexually violent person and his need for treatment. Participants read details of a hypothetical sexual assault of a female minor and of an adult. Expert testimony of his risk assessment consisted of clinical opinion versus structured-clinical judgment (SCJ) versus actuarial assessment. Participants perceived clinical-opinion and SCJ testimony as equally influential when forming judgments of future dangerousness. In the context of treatment, however, participants relied on actuarial testimony when judging potential for risk. In addition, attributional complexity (AC) moderated perceptions of sexual risk. Overall, results point to the need for continued refinement of assessment techniques when determining dangerousness and need for treatment

Development of Competency Based Assessment Model on Job Performance in Family Welfare Education Apprenticeship

The assessment tool to evaluate learner performance on the apprenticeship is variety. Therefore, we were need a standardized assessment tool. This study was attempt to develop a competency based assessment model on job performance in apprentice of the family welfare education. Problem solving was conducted using research and development approach, through stages of: (1) a study introduction, (2) a development model, and (3) a validation model. The research subjects are internal and external tutors, also a learner intern. Data collection was carried out by interviews, observation, survey and expert judgment. The results showed that the planning, the instrument and the implementation of the assessment was the development of competency based assessment model on job performance in family welfare education apprenticeship. Planning assessment was consisting of components of the purpose, job performance, and assessment methods. An instrument assessment was use a test of performance in the form of assessment rubrics. The implementation of the assessment was covering a preparation, collecting, judging, deciding, and moderation stage. From the validation model through the expert judgment, it turns out that assessment model was already developed feasible to implement on job performance assessment in family welfare education apprenticeshi

Environmental risk assessment in a contaminated estuary: an integrated weight of evidence approach as a decision support tool

Environmental risk assessment of complex ecosystems such as estuaries is a challenge, where innovative and integrated approaches are needed. The present work aimed at developing an innovative integrative methodology to evaluate in an impacted estuary (the Sado, in Portugal, was taken as case study), the adverse effects onto both ecosystem and human health. For the purpose, new standardized lines of evidence based on multiple quantitative data were integrated into a weight of evidence according to a best expert judgment approach. The best professional judgment for a weight of evidence approach in the present study was based on the following lines of evidence: i) human contamination pathways; ii) human health effects: chronic disease; iii) human health effects: reproductive health; iv) human health effects: health care; v) human exposure through consumption of local agriculture produce; vi) exposure to contaminated of water wells and agriculture soils; vii) contamination of the estuarine sedimentary environment (metal and organic contaminants); viii) effects on benthic organisms with commercial value; and ix) genotoxic potential of sediments. Each line of evidence was then ordinally ranked by levels of ecological or human health risk, according to a tabular decision matrix and expert judgment. Fifteen experts scored two fishing areas of the Sado estuary and a control estuarine area, in a scale of increasing environmental risk and management actions to be taken. The integrated assessment allowed concluding that the estuary should not be regarded as impacted by a specific toxicant, such as metals and organic compounds hitherto measured, but by the cumulative risk of a complex mixture of contaminants. The proven adverse effects on species with commercial value may be used to witness the environmental quality of the estuarine ecosystem. This method argues in favor of expert judgment and qualitative assessment as a decision support tool to the integrative management of estuaries. Namely it allows communicating environmental risk and proposing mitigation measures to local authorities and population under a holistic perspective as an alternative to narrow single line of evidence approaches, which is mandatory to understand cause and effect relationships in complex areas like estuaries.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Integrating expert knowledge with data in Bayesian networks: Preserving data-driven expectations when the expert variables remain unobserved

When developing a causal probabilistic model, i.e. a Bayesian network (BN), it is common to incorporate expert knowledge of factors that are important for decision analysis but where historical data are unavailable or difficult to obtain. This paper focuses on the problem whereby the distribution of some continuous variable in a BN is known from data, but where we wish to explicitly model the impact of some additional expert variable (for which there is expert judgment but no data). Because the statistical outcomes are already influenced by the causes an expert might identify as variables missing from the dataset, the incentive here is to add the expert factor to the model in such a way that the distribution of the data variable is preserved when the expert factor remains unobserved. We provide a method for eliciting expert judgment that ensures the expected values of a data variable are preserved under all the known conditions. We show that it is generally neither possible, nor realistic, to preserve the variance of the data variable, but we provide a method towards determining the accuracy of expertise in terms of the extent to which the variability of the revised empirical distribution is minimised. We also describe how to incorporate the assessment of extremely rare or previously unobserved events

Risk Assessment at the Cosmetic Product Manufacturer by Expert Judgment Method

A case study was performed in a cosmetic product manufacturer. We have identified the main risk factors of occupational accidents and their causes. Risk of accidents is assessed by the expert judgment method. Event tree for the most probable accident is built and recommendations on improvement of occupational health and safety protection system at the cosmetic product manufacturer are developed. The results of this paper can be used to develop actions to improve the occupational safety and health system in the chemical industry

Risk Assessment at the Cosmetic Product Manufacturer by Expert Judgment Method

A case study was performed in a cosmetic product manufacturer. We have identified the main risk factors of occupational accidents and their causes. Risk of accidents is assessed by the expert judgment method. Event tree for the most probable accident is built and recommendations on improvement of occupational health and safety protection system at the cosmetic product manufacturer are developed. The results of this paper can be used to develop actions to improve the occupational safety and health system in the chemical industry

Pengembangan Instrumen Penilaian Kinerja Pada Praktikum Struktur Dan Fungsi Sel Di SMA Negeri 1 Kota Jambi

This research aims to produce a final product in the form of a performance-assessment instrument on Cell Structure and Function experiment. The development model is ADDIE. Based on expert\u27s judgment, the instrument was valid and can be tested in the field. Field-test results shown that the product performs high validity and reliability value on measuring student performance on Cell Structure and Function experiment. Therefore, it is concluded that this performance-assessment instrument theoretically and practically has a good quality for measuring student performance in both process and product performance on Cell Structure and Function experiment