On the analogy between the evolution of thermodynamicand bibliometric systems: a breakthrough or justa bubble?

This paper presents an in depth study of an interesting analogy, recently proposed by Prathap (Scientometrics 87(3):515-524, 2011a), between the evolution of thermodynamic and bibliometric systems. The goal is to highlight some weaknesses and clarify some ‘‘dark sides'' in the conceptual framework of this analogy, discussing the formal validity and practical meaning of the concepts of Energy, Exergy and Entropy in bibliometrics. Specifically, this analogy highlights the following major criticalities: (1) the definitions of E and X are controversial, (2) the equivalence classes of E and X are questionable, (3) the parallel between the evolution of thermodynamic and bibliometric systems is forced, (4) X is a non-monotonic performance indicator, and (5) in bibliometrics the condition of ‘‘thermodynamic perfection'' is questionable. Argument is supported by many analytical demonstrations and practical example

A short survey on Air Quality Indicators: properties, use and (mis)use

Purpose - Analysis and comparison of three existing indicators of the air quality: the American air quality index, the French Atmo, and the Italian Indice di Qualita` dell'Aria. Design/methodology/approach - International general and organic regulations to control air quality do not exist yet. Consequently many countries have independently implemented specific indicators to monitor the air pollution and then alert people of resulting health risks. The paper focuses on three of them. Each one is independently presented showing the peculiarities. Therefore, these indicators are compared to identify the features they have in common, as well as those that set them apart, and to figure out which are either restrictive or permissive, and what are their qualities and drawbacks. Findings - The three mentioned indicators convert the real health risk due to air pollution into numerical information, in different ways. Doing this, they carry out some simplifications or assumptions, which can be questionable. The main difficulty is to understand if the indicators aggregate the different pollutant concentrations consistently with the real effects on human health. Research limitations/implications - This paper analyses only three specific indicators of the air quality, selected among the existing ones. Practical implications - Indicators should carefully be analysed to understand if they properly represents the real effects of pollutants on human health. The most critical aspect to consider is the aggregation of the different pollutant concentrations in one information. Originality/value - This paper analyses the efficacy of representation of some air quality indicators. It discusses if indicators aggregation is consistent with the real effects on human healt

Classification of Performance and Quality Indicators in Manufacturing

A critical aspect in operations management is to represent the firm goals properly. This is usually done by translating the organisational results and objectives in ‘performance measurements'. The scientific literature shows many applications in different fields such as quality, production, logistics, marketing, etc. Nevertheless, a general theory formalising basic and application concepts is still lacking. This paper shows a classification of ‘performance indicators' in manufacturing, providing a mathematical structure to the concept of ‘indicator'. This approach is based on the formalism of the Representation Theory. All the mentioned concepts are explained and discussed through practical example

A proposal of a new paradigm for national quality certification systems

The goal of this paper is to suggest a new incentive model that is capable of creating the conditions for the autonomous growth of diffusion and credibility of the ISO 9000 national quality certification syste

ISO/TS 16949: analysis of the diffusion and current trends

The automotive industry has always shown a particular interest toward quality management systems, which resulted in the development of several different specific standards. As a result of this, by the mid-1980s, automotive suppliers were subject to numerous national and customer specific regulations. The proliferation of these standards and the need to create a single reference model led to Technical Specification (TS) 16949, an ISO technical specification aimed at representing a comprehensive quality management system for the global automotive industry. Since its early introduction, TS 16949 has encountered a certain success thanks to its feature of unifying and harmonizing the already existing standards. This paper studies the global evolution and diffusion of this technical specification, observing its impact on the local economies. The argument is supported by many empirical data

Aggregating multiple ordinal rankings in engineering design: the best model according to the Kendall's coefficient of concordance

AbstractAggregating the preferences of a group of experts is a recurring problem in several fields, including engineering design; in a nutshell, each expert formulates an ordinal ranking of a set of alternatives and the resulting rankings should be aggregated into a collective one. Many aggregation models have been proposed in the literature, showing strengths and weaknesses, in line with the implications of Arrow's impossibility theorem. Furthermore, the coherence of the collective ranking with respect to the expert rankings may change depending on: (i) the expert rankings themselves and (ii) the aggregation model adopted. This paper assesses this coherence for a variety of aggregation models, through a recent test based on the Kendall's coefficient of concordance (W), and studies the characteristics of those models that are most likely to achieve higher coherence. Interestingly, the so-called Borda count model often provides best coherence, with some exceptions in the case of collective rankings with ties. The description is supported by practical examples

Quality & Quantity journal: a bibliometric snapshot

This article analyzes the Quality & Quantity journal from the point of view of some bibliometric indicators: the Hirsch (h) and the g-index for journals, the total number of citations, the h- and the g-spectrum. Journal time evolution is also studied and discussed in detail. As a final point, an interesting issue about how to objectively evaluate the journal popularity in the professional world—rather than the scientific/academic—is presented and left open

Prioritization of QFD Customer Requirements Based on the Law of Comparative Judgments

Quality function deployment (QFD) is a useful tool to improve the design/development process of products and services. The initial phases of the QFD process—that is, those concerning the collection and analysis of the so-called voice of the customer—are probably the most critical, because any distortion can propagate to the whole process results, making it ineffective or even misleading. The focus of this article is on the phase of prioritization of customer requirements (CRs). There are numerous techniques for this task; however, (1) the simplest often introduce questionable or unrealistic assumptions, whereas (2) the most sophisticated often require too much elaborate and repetitious information from customers, which may lead to inconsistencies. This article introduces a new prioritization technique based on the Thurstone's law of comparative judgment. This technique makes it possible to aggregate the evaluations by multiple respondents and transform them into an interval scale, which depicts the relative importance of CRs. The greatest strength of this technique is combining a refined theoretical model with a simple and user-friendly data collection process. The description is supported by a realistic application example concerning the prioritization of QFD's CRs in the design of an aircraft sea

Critical remarks on the Italian research assessment exercise VQR 2011–2014

For nearly a decade, several national exercises have been implemented for assessing the Italian research performance, from the viewpoint of universities and other research institutions. The penultimate one – i.e., the VQR 2004–2010, which adopted a hybrid evaluation approach based on bibliometric analysis and peer review – suffered heavy criticism at a national and international level. The architecture of the subsequent exercise – i.e., the VQR 2011–2014, still in progress – is partly similar to that of the previous one, except for a few presumed improvements. Nevertheless, this other exercise is suffering heavy criticism too. This paper presents a structured discussion of the VQR 2011–2014, collecting and organizing some critical arguments so far emerged, and developing them in detail. Some of the major vulnerabilities of the VQR 2011–2014 are: (1) the fact that evaluations cover a relatively small fraction of the scientific publications produced by the researchers involved in the evaluation, (2) incorrect and anachronistic use of the journal metrics (i.e., ISI Impact Factor and similar ones) for assessing individual papers, and (3) conceptually misleading criteria for normalizing and aggregating the bibliometric indicators in use