Perceived game uncertainty and suspense: A test of the uncertainty of outcome hypothesis using a stated preference approach

The Uncertainty of Outcome Hypothesis (UOH), a core topic in sports economics literature for more than six decades, posits that fans’ interest in (and consequently the demand for) a sports contest increases the more uncertain its outcome is expected to be. Nevertheless, despite the theoretical relevance of the UOH and its prominence as justification for interventions aiming to maintain or improve the level of competitive balance (CB) within leagues, decades of research have struggled to provide clear evidence on its empirical relevance. This motivated two distinct lines of research which based on behavioural economic concepts provide valuable insights on possible reasons behind this lack of clear evidence. The first line builds upon the idea that fans’ subjective evaluations of uncertainty and suspense might deviate from ‘objective’ measures and elaborates on behavioural anomalies that might cause such a divergence. The second line draws on the prospect theory and the concept of reference-dependent preferences combined with loss aversion in order to provide for the first time a consistent theoretical model that can explain fans preferences for close contests as well as for games involving a favourite. This dissertation draws upon the two aforementioned lines and endeavours to bridge between different behavioural economic explanations on the (ir)relevance of the UOH. To do so, the herein presented studies rely on a stated preference approach, develop realistic consumption scenarios and test the UOH using individually weighted evaluations of uncertainty and suspense. The aims, amongst others, are: (i) to study the concept of perceived game suspense in single-game settings and the presence of behavioural anomalies in this regard; (ii) to develop a measure of perceived game uncertainty that is comparable to objective measures and examine its relation with perceived game suspense; (iii) to provide insights on whether the finding that fans’ preferences for game uncertainty are dominated by loss aversion emerges also in stated preference settings; (iv) to provide empirical evidence on the role of supporter status, type of games and consumption modes in the analysis of the UOH, as well as to extend its examination to between-country settings in order to study potential cross-continental differences in game uncertainty preferences as suggested by the literature. Econometric findings reveal, amongst others, that: (i) perceived game suspense is positively related to the demand for soccer events, pointing towards the presence of a “satisficing” threshold in the context of in-stadium attendance; (ii) fans do not perceive game uncertainty differently than how economists have tended to measure it, however, it is shown that the concepts of perceived game uncertainty and suspense are distinct from each other, with the latter being more likely to proxy quality-related aspects and match relevance; (iii) the demand for live soccer telecasts increases when fans expect a certain home or away team win, which could be explained by fans exhibiting loss aversion with regard to game uncertainty; (iv) this relation remains both in within- and between-country settings, independently of supporter status and/or the type of games, while the consumption mode seems to affect the predictions

A parametric rule for planning and management of multiple-reservoir systems

Abstract. A parametric rule for multireservoir system operation is formulated and tested. It is a generalization of the well-known space rule to simultaneously account for various system operating goals in addition to the standard goal of avoiding unnecessary spills, including: avoidance of leakage losses, avoidance of conveyance problems, the impact of the reservoir system topology, and assurance of satisfying secondary uses. Theoretical values of the rule’s parameters for each one of these isolated goals are derived. In practice, parameters are evaluated to optimize one or more objective functions selected by the user. The rule is embedded in a simulation model so that optimization requires repeated simulations of the system operation with specific values of the parameters each time. The rule is tested on the case of the multi-reservoir water supply system of the city of Athens, Greece, which is driven by all of the operating goals listed above. Two problems at the system design level are tackled. First, the total release from the system is maximized for a selected level of failure probability. Second, the annual operating cost is minimized for given levels of water demand and failure probability. A detailed simulation model is used in the case study. Sensitivity analysis to the rule’s parameters revealed a subset of insensitive parameters that allowed for rule simplification. Finally, the rule is validated through comparison with a number of heuristic rules also applied to the test case. 2 1

Sensitivity of surface runoff to drought and climate change : application for shared river basins

This study quantifies the sensitivity of surface runoff to drought and climate change in the Diyala watershed shared between Iraq and Iran. This was achieved through a combined use of a wide range of changes in the amount of precipitation (a decline between 0 and −40%) and in the potential evapotranspiration rate (an increase between 0 and +30%). The Medbasin-M rainfall-runoff model was used for runoff simulation. The model was calibrated for twelve hydrologic years (1962−1973), and the simulation results were validated with the observed annual runoff for nine water years (1974−1982). For the calibration period, the correlation coefficient (r), the root mean squared error (RMSE), the mean absolute error (MAE) and the index of agreement (IoA) were 0.893, 2.117, 1.733 and 0.852, respectively. The corresponding values for validation were 0.762, 1.250, 1.093 and 0.863 in this order. The Reconnaissance Drought Index (RDI) and the Streamflow Drought Index (SDI) were analysed using the DrinC software. Three nomographs were introduced to quantify the projected reductions in the annual runoff and the anticipated RDI and SDI values, respectively. The proposed methodology offers a simple, powerful and generic approach for predicting the rate of change (%) in annual runoff under climate change scenarios

Adaptation strategy to mitigate the impact of climate change on water resources in arid and semi-arid regions : a case study

Climate change and drought phenomena impacts have become a growing concern for water resources engineers and policy makers, mainly in arid and semi-arid areas. This study aims to contribute to the development of a decision support tool to prepare water resources managers and planners for climate change adaptation. The Hydrologiska Byråns Vattenbalansavdelning (The Water Balance Department of the Hydrological Bureau) hydrologic model was used to define the boundary conditions for the reservoir capacity yield model comprising daily reservoir inflow from a representative example watershed with the size of 14,924 km2 into a reservoir with the capacity of 6.80 Gm3. The reservoir capacity yield model was used to simulate variability in climate change-induced differences in reservoir capacity needs and performance (operational probability of failure, resilience, and vulnerability). Owing to the future precipitation reduction and potential evapotranspiration increase during the worst case scenario (−40% precipitation and +30% potential evapotranspiration), substantial reductions in streamflow of between −56% and −58% are anticipated for the dry and wet seasons, respectively. Furthermore, model simulations recommend that as a result of future climatic conditions, the reservoir operational probability of failure would generally increase due to declined reservoir inflow. The study developed preparedness plans to combat the consequences of climate change and drought

SOURCE TO TAP URBAN WATER CYCLE MODELLING

This work was supported by TRUST (TRansitions to the Urban Water Services of Tomorrow) research project.The continuous expansion of urban areas is associated with increased water demand, both for domestic and non-domestic uses. To cover this additional demand, centralised infrastructure, such as water supply and distribution networks tend to become more and more complicated and are eventually over-extended with adverse effects on their reliability. To address this, there exist two main strategies: (a) Tools and algorithms are employed to optimise the operation of the external water supply system, in an effort to minimise risk of failure to cover the demand (either due to the limited availability of water resources or due to the limited capacity of the transmission system and treatment plants) and (b) demand management is employed to reduce the water demand per capita. Dedicated tools do exist to support the implementation of these two strategies separately. However, there is currently no tool capable of handling the complete urban water system, from source to tap, allowing for an investigation of these two strategies at the same time and thus exploring synergies between the two. This paper presents a new version of the UWOT model (Makropoulos et al., 2008), which adopts a metabolism modelling approach and is now capable of simulating the complete urban water cycle from source to tap and back again: the tool simulates the whole water supply network from the generation of demand at the household level to the water reservoirs and tracks wastewater generation from the household through the wastewater system and the treatment plants to the water bodies. UWOT functionality is demonstrated in the case of the water system of Athens and outputs are compared against the current operational tool used by the Water Company of Athens. Results are presented and discussed: The discussion highlights the conditions under which a single source-to-tap model is more advantageous than dedicated subsystem models.Rozos, E.; Makropoulos, C. (2013). SOURCE TO TAP URBAN WATER CYCLE MODELLING. Environmental Modelling & Software. 41:139-150. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envsoft.2012.11.0151391504

Integrated methodological framework fos assesing the risk of failure in water supply incorporating drought forecast. Case study: Andean regulated river basin

[EN] Hydroclimatic drought conditions can affect the hydrological services offered by mountain river basins causing severe impacts on the population, becoming a challenge for water resource managers in Andean river basins. This study proposes an integrated methodological framework for assessing the risk of failure in water supply, incorporating probabilistic drought forecasts, which assists in making decisions regarding the satisfaction of consumptive, non-consumptive and environmental requirements under water scarcity conditions. Monte Carlo simulation was used to assess the risk of failure in multiple stochastic scenarios, which incorporate probabilistic forecasts of drought events based on a Markov chains (MC) model using a recently developed drought index (DI). This methodology was tested in the Machángara river basin located in the south of Ecuador. Results were grouped in integrated satisfaction indexes of the system (DSIG). They demonstrated that the incorporation of probabilistic drought forecasts could better target the projections of simulation scenarios, with a view of obtaining realistic situations instead of optimistic projections that would lead to riskier decisions. Moreover, they contribute to more effective results in order to propose multiple alternatives for prevention and/or mitigation under drought conditions.This study was part of the doctoral thesis of Aviles A. at the Technical University of Valencia. This research was funded by the University of Cuenca through its Research Department (DIUC) and the Municipal public enterprise of telecommunications, drinking water, sewage and sanitation of Cuenca (ETAPA) through the projects: BIdentificacion de los procesos hidrometeorologicos que desencadenan inundaciones en la ciudad de Cuenca usando un radar de precipitacion" and "Ciclos meteorologicos y evapotranspiracion a lo largo de una gradiente altitudinal del Parque Nacional Cajas". The authors also thank INAMHI and the CBRM for providing the information for this study. The authors wish to thank the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness for its financial support through the ERAS project (CTM2016-77804-P). We thank Angel Vazquez, who helped in the programming of the multiple simulations. Also we thank to the TropiSeca project.Avilés-Añazco, A.; Solera Solera, A.; Paredes Arquiola, J.; Pedro Monzonís, M. (2018). Integrated methodological framework fos assesing the risk of failure in water supply incorporating drought forecast. Case study: Andean regulated river basin. Water Resources Management. 32(4):1209-1223. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11269-017-1863-7S12091223324Andreu J, Capilla J, Sanchís E (1996) AQUATOOL, a generalized decision-support system for water-resources planning and operational management. 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