Search results for "certainty"
showing 10 items of 1057 documents
Monte Carlo dosimetric study of the medium dose rate CSM40 source
2013
Abstract The 137Cs medium dose rate (MDR) CSM40 source model (Eckert & Ziegler BEBIG, Germany) is in clinical use but no dosimetric dataset has been published. This study aims to obtain dosimetric data for the CSM40 source for its use in clinical practice as required by the American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM) and the European Society for Radiotherapy and Oncology (ESTRO). Penelope2008 and Geant4 Monte Carlo codes were used to characterize this source dosimetrically. It was located in an unbounded water phantom with composition and mass density as recommended by AAPM and ESTRO. Due to the low photon energies of 137Cs, absorbed dose was approximated by collisional kerma. Add…
A Bayesian approach to assess data from radionuclide activity analyses in environmental samples
2007
A Bayesian statistical approach is introduced to assess experimental data from the analyses of radionuclide activity concentration in environmental samples (low activities). A theoretical model has been developed that allows the use of known prior information about the value of the measurand (activity), together with the experimental value determined through the measurement. The model has been applied to data of the Inter-laboratory Proficiency Test organised periodically among Spanish environmental radioactivity laboratories that are producing the radiochemical results for the Spanish radioactive monitoring network. A global improvement of laboratories performance is produced when this pri…
Influence of rating curve uncertainty on daily rainfall–runoff model predictions
2005
River discharge observations are usually affected by uncertainty, which is due to many concurrent causes and strongly affects the response of rainfall-runoff models. The present paper is aimed at studying the influence of imperfect rating curve knowledge on the uncertainty of the response of a daily conceptual linear-nonlinear rainfall-runoff model. To describe the impact of imperfect rating curve knowledge, simulations have been conducted using a conceptual rainfall-runoff model and continuous daily series of rainfall, air temperature and discharges recorded in a Sicilian catchment. The GLUE procedure was used to introduce the uncertainty of the rating curve in a classical rainfall-runoff …
Models of Dynamical Modelling Under Uncertainty
1986
The objective of this work is to modelize the evolution of a Model-System to be adapted to a Random System. This evolution is described by means of the change of a probabilistic function, through deterministic rules and in function of the random responses of the modelized System. This probabilistic function can describe the relative weight of distinct submodels (deterministic or random Systems, with constant or variable stimulus), or the stimulus-response relation in the Model-System (Adaptative Random System). We conclude that the Adaptative Random Model permits a more precise, simple and economical modelling.
Assessment of building energy modelling studies to meet the requirements of the new Energy Performance of Buildings Directive
2020
Abstract The cost optimal method (COM) as applied in the Energy Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) uses “non-calibrated deterministic reference buildings (RBs)”. Such RBs are defined with single envelope and equipment parameter values, for which calibration with actual building stock energy performance (EP) is not undertaken. Thus, it is not possible to visualise the effect of uncertainties or diversity in the input parameters on cost-optimal level benchmarks and to verify the choice of RBs. The paper proposes an update to the COM via use of “Probabilistic Bayesian calibrated RBs” to handle uncertainties and produce more realistic cost optimal levels to support policy makers in devis…
Handling epistemic uncertainty in the Fault Tree Analysis using interval valued expert information
2014
Risk Analysis ( RA) is a meaningful process in every industrial context, particularly referring to major hazard plants. In such sites, input reliability data are generally poor so leading to a partial or incomplete knowledge of the failure process. As a consequence, RA is always affected by the so called epistemic uncertainty which presence makes inappropriate the classical probabilistic approach. Therefore, the present work deals with such a kind of uncertainty in the Fault Tree Analysis (FTA) and proposes a new aggregation rule to combine the interval-valued information supplied by a team of experts about each Basic Event ( BE). The aggregation leads to an interval which bounds are modell…
A bottom-up procedure to calculate the Top Event probability in presence of epistemic uncertainty
2012
Industrial plants may be subjected to very dangerous events. Different methodologies are employed to evaluate the probability of their occurrence, as Process Safety Analysis (PSA) or Risk Analysis (RA). However, since for rare events reliability data are poor, the epistemic uncertainty needs to be considered. In this context, the classical probabilistic approach cannot be successfully used and then different approaches must be taken into account. Actually, this paper proposes the use of the Evidence Theory or Dempster-Shafer Theory (DST) to deal with data characterizing rare events in high risk industrial sites. In particular, a classical Fault Tree Analysis (FTA) is considered when the onl…
Uncertain outcome presentations bias decisions: experimental evidence from Finland and Italy
2016
Even in their everyday lives people are expected to make difficult decisions objectively and rationally, no matter how complex or uncertain the situation. In this research, we study how the format of presentation and the amount of presented information concerning risky events influence the decision-making process, and the propensity to take risk in decision makers. The results of an exploratory survey conducted in Finland and in Italy suggest that decision-making behavior changes according to the way the information is presented. We provide experimental evidence that different representations of expected outcomes create distinct cognitive biases and as a result affect the decisions made. Th…
Modeling risk perception in ATIS context through Fuzzy Logic
2011
Abstract This research is aimed at investigating the effect of accuracy of ATIS (Advanced Traveller Information Systems) in terms of route choices and travellers concordance to informative system. A Stated Preference Experiment has been made by using a Travel Simulator developed at the Technische Universiteit of Delft (The Netherlands). During the experiment respondents have been asked to make repeated route choices in presence of ATIS. Two kinds of information have been tested: descriptive (respondents are provided with the estimated travel times on each route), and prescriptive (respondents are provided with the estimated shortest route). For each kind of information four levels of accura…
Shame in decision making under risk conditions: Understanding the effect of transparency.
2017
The role played by the emotion of shame in the area of decision-making in situations of risk has hardly been studied. In this article, we show how the socio-moral emotions and the anticipated feeling of shame associated with different options can determine our decisions, even overriding the cognitive choice tendency proposed by the certainty effect. To do so, we carried out an experiment with university students as participants, dividing them into four experimental conditions. Our findings suggest that people avoid making unethical decisions, both when these decisions are made public to others and when they remain in the private sphere. This result seems to indicate that the main factor in …