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This chapter of the book seeks to use famous mathematical functions (statistical distribution functions) in evaluating and analyzing supply chain network data related to supply chain management (SCM) elements in organizations. In other words, the main purpose of this chapter is to find the best-fitted statistical distribution functions for SCM data. Explaining how to best fit the statistical distribution function along with the explanation of all possible aspects of a function for selected components of SCM from this chapter will make a significant attraction for production and services experts who will lead their organization to the path of competitive excellence. The main core of the chapter is the reliability values related to the reliability function calculated by the relevant chart and extracting other information based on other aspects of statistical distribution functions such as probability density, cumulative distribution, and failure function. This chapter of the book will turn readers into professional users of statistical distribution functions in mathematics for analyzing supply chain element data.

Despite representing a relatively small portion of the population, those who experience repeat victimization make up a significant share of all sexual and violent crimes, implying that perpetrators target them repeatedly. Indeed, research reveals specific traits (e.g. submissiveness) and behaviors (e.g. gait) related to past victimization or vulnerability. The purpose of this study is to explore the link between personality traits, self-assessed vulnerability and nonverbal cues.

In all, 40 undergraduate Canadian women were videotaped while recording a dating profile. Self-report measures of assertiveness, personality traits and vulnerability ratings for future sexual or violent victimization were obtained following the video-recording. The videotape was coded for nonverbal behaviors that have been related to assertiveness or submissiveness.

Self-perceived sexual vulnerability correlated with reduced assertiveness and dominance and increased emotionality (e.g. fear and anxiety). Additionally, nonverbal behaviors differed based on personality traits: self-touch was linked to lower assertiveness, dominance and extraversion and higher submissiveness, emotionality and warm-agreeableness.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study of its kind to consider the relationships between personality, self-perceived vulnerability and nonverbal behaviors among college-aged women. Potential implications, including enhancing autonomy and self-efficacy, are discussed.

Fused deposition modeling (FDM) is an extensively used additive manufacturing method with the capacity to build complex functional components. Due to the machinery and environmental factors during manufacturing, the FDM parts inevitably demonstrated uncertainty in properties and performance. This study aims to identify the stochastic constitutive behaviors of FDM-fabricated polylactic acid (PLA) tensile specimens induced by the manufacturing process.

By conducting the tensile test, the effects of the printing machine selection and three major manufacturing parameters (i.e., printing speed S, nozzle temperature T and layer thickness t) on the stochastic constitutive behaviors were investigated. The influence of the loading rate was also explained. In addition, the data-driven models were established to quantify and optimize the uncertain mechanical behaviors of FDM-based tensile specimens under various printing parameters.

As indicated by the results, the uncertain behaviors of the stiffness and strength of the PLA tensile specimens were dominated by the printing speed and nozzle temperature, respectively. The manufacturing-induced stochastic constitutive behaviors could be accurately captured by the developed data-driven model with the R² over 0.98 on the testing dataset. The optimal parameters obtained from the data-driven framework were T = 231.3595 °C, S = 40.3179 mm/min and t = 0.2343 mm, which were in good agreement with the experiments.

The developed data-driven models can also be integrated into the design and characterization of parts fabricated by extrusion and other additive manufacturing technologies.

Stochastic behaviors of additively manufactured products were revealed by considering extensive manufacturing factors. The data-driven models were proposed to facilitate the description and optimization of the FDM products and control their quality.

This study aims to explore and empirically test variables influencing material delivery schedule inaccuracies?

A mixed-method case approach is applied. Explanatory variables are identified from the literature and explored in a qualitative analysis at an automotive original equipment manufacturer. Using logistic regression and random forest classification models, quantitative data (historical schedule transactions and internal data) enables the testing of the predictive difference of variables under various planning horizons and inaccuracy levels.

The effects on delivery schedule inaccuracies are contingent on a decoupling point, and a variable may have a combined amplifying (complexity generating) and stabilizing (complexity absorbing) moderating effect. Product complexity variables are significant regardless of the time horizon, and the item’s order life cycle is a significant variable with predictive differences that vary. Decoupling management is identified as a mechanism for generating complexity absorption capabilities contributing to delivery schedule accuracy.

The findings provide guidelines for exploring and finding patterns in specific variables to improve material delivery schedule inaccuracies and input into predictive forecasting models.

The findings contribute to explaining material delivery schedule variations, identifying potential root causes and moderators, empirically testing and validating effects and conceptualizing features that cause and moderate inaccuracies in relation to decoupling management and complexity theory literature?

Sustainable development goals (SDGs) are gaining significant importance in the current environment. Many businesses are keen to adopt SDGs to get a competitive edge. There are certain challenges in realigning the present working scenario for sustainable development, which is a primary concern for society. Various firms are adopting sustainable engineering (SE) practices to tackle such issues. Artificial intelligence (AI) is an emerging technology that can help the ineffective adoption of sustainable practices in an uncertain environment. In this regard, there is a need to review the current research practices in the field of SE in AI. The purpose of the present study is to comprehensive review the research trend in the field of SE in AI.

This work presents a review of AI applications in SE for decision-making in an uncertain environment. SCOPUS database was considered for shortlisting the articles. Specific keywords on AI, SE and decision-making were given, and a total of 127 articles were shortlisted after implying inclusion and exclusion criteria.

Bibliometric study and network analyses were performed to analyse the current research trends and to see the research collaboration between researchers and countries. Emerging research themes were identified by using structural topic modelling (STM) and were discussed further.

Research propositions corresponding to each research theme were presented for future research directions. Finally, the implications of the study were discussed.

This work presents a systematic review of articles in the field of AI applications in SE with the help of bibliometric study, network analyses and STM.

Warranty-based big data analysis has attracted a great deal of attention because of its key capabilities and role in improving product quality while minimizing costs. Information and details about particular parts (components) repair and replacement during the warranty term, usually stored in the after-sales service database, can be used to solve problems in a variety of sectors. Due to the small number of studies related to the complete analysis of parts failure patterns in the automotive industry in the literature, this paper focuses on discovering and assessing the impact of lesser-studied factors on the failure of auto parts in the warranty period from the after-sales data of an automotive manufacturer.

The interconnected method used in this study for analyzing failure patterns is formed by combining association rules (AR) mining and Bayesian networks (BNs).

This research utilized AR analysis to extract valuable information from warranty data, exploring the relationship between component failure, time and location. Additionally, BNs were employed to investigate other potential factors influencing component failure, which could not be identified using Association Rules alone. This approach provided a more comprehensive evaluation of the data and valuable insights for decision-making in relevant industries.

This study's findings are believed to be practical in achieving a better dissection and providing a comprehensive package that can be utilized to increase component quality and overcome cross-sectional solutions. The integration of these methods allowed for a wider exploration of potential factors influencing component failure, enhancing the validity and depth of the research findings.

Estimation of (in)efficiency became a popular practice that witnessed applications in virtually any sector of the economy over the last few decades. Many different models were deployed for such endeavors, with Stochastic Frontier Analysis (SFA) models dominating the econometric literature. Among the most popular variants of SFA are Aigner, Lovell, and Schmidt (1977), which launched the literature, and Kumbhakar, Ghosh, and McGuckin (1991), which pioneered the branch taking account of the (in)efficiency term via the so-called environmental variables or determinants of inefficiency. Focusing on these two prominent approaches in SFA, the goal of this chapter is to try to understand the production inefficiency of public hospitals in Queensland. While doing so, a recognized yet often overlooked phenomenon emerges where possible dramatic differences (and consequently very different policy implications) can be derived from different models, even within one paradigm of SFA models. This emphasizes the importance of exploring many alternative models, and scrutinizing their assumptions, before drawing policy implications, especially when such implications may substantially affect people’s lives, as is the case in the hospital sector.

Although the effects of both news sentiment and expectations on price in financial markets have now been extensively demonstrated, the jointness that these predictors can have in their effects on price has not been well-defined. Investigating causal ordering in their effects on price can further our understanding of both direct and indirect effects in their relationship to market price.

We use autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) methodology to examine the relationship between agent expectations and news sentiment in predicting price in a financial market. The ARDL estimation is supplemented by Grainger causality testing.

In the ARDL models we implement, measures of expectations and news sentiment and their lags were confirmed to be significantly related to market price in separate estimates. Our results further indicate that in models of relationships between these predictors, news sentiment is a significant predictor of agent expectations, but agent expectations are not significant predictors of news sentiment. Granger-causality estimates confirmed the causal inferences from ARDL results.

Taken together, the results extend our understanding of the dynamics of expectations and sentiment as exogenous information sources that relate to price in financial markets. They suggest that the extensively cited predictor of news sentiment can have both a direct effect on market price and an indirect effect on price through agent expectations.

Even traditional financial management firms now commonly track behavioral measures of expectations and market sentiment. More complete understanding of the relationship between these predictors of market price can further their representation in predictive models.

This article extends the frequently reported bivariate relationship of expectations and sentiment to market price to examine jointness in the relationship between these variables in predicting price. Inference from ARDL estimates is supported by Grainger-causality estimates.

The Chinese housing market has witnessed rapid growth during the past decade and the significance of housing price forecasting has undoubtedly elevated, becoming an important issue to investors and policymakers. This study aims to examine neural networks (NNs) for office property price index forecasting from 10 major Chinese cities for July 2005–April 2021.

The authors aim at building simple and accurate NNs to contribute to pure technical forecasts of the Chinese office property market. To facilitate the analysis, the authors explore different model settings over algorithms, delays, hidden neurons and data-spitting ratios.

The authors reach a simple NN with three delays and three hidden neurons, which leads to stable performance of about 1.45% average relative root mean square error across the 10 cities for the training, validation and testing phases.

The results could be used on a standalone basis or combined with fundamental forecasts to form perspectives of office property price trends and conduct policy analysis.

Web users rely heavily on online content make decisions without assessing the veracity of the content. The online content comprising text, image, video or audio may be tampered with to influence public opinion. Since the consumers of online information (misinformation) tend to trust the content when the image(s) supplement the text, image manipulation software is increasingly being used to forge the images. To address the crucial problem of image manipulation, this study focusses on developing a deep-learning-based image forgery detection framework.

The proposed deep-learning-based framework aims to detect images forged using copy-move and splicing techniques. The image transformation technique aids the identification of relevant features for the network to train effectively. After that, the pre-trained customized convolutional neural network is used to train on the public benchmark datasets, and the performance is evaluated on the test dataset using various parameters.

The comparative analysis of image transformation techniques and experiments conducted on benchmark datasets from a variety of socio-cultural domains establishes the effectiveness and viability of the proposed framework. These findings affirm the potential applicability of proposed framework in real-time image forgery detection.

This study bears implications for several important aspects of research on image forgery detection. First this research adds to recent discussion on feature extraction and learning for image forgery detection. While prior research on image forgery detection, hand-crafted the features, the proposed solution contributes to stream of literature that automatically learns the features and classify the images. Second, this research contributes to ongoing effort in curtailing the spread of misinformation using images. The extant literature on spread of misinformation has prominently focussed on textual data shared over social media platforms. The study addresses the call for greater emphasis on the development of robust image transformation techniques.

This study carries important practical implications for various domains such as forensic sciences, media and journalism where image data is increasingly being used to make inferences. The integration of image forgery detection tools can be helpful in determining the credibility of the article or post before it is shared over the Internet. The content shared over the Internet by the users has become an important component of news reporting. The framework proposed in this paper can be further extended and trained on more annotated real-world data so as to function as a tool for fact-checkers.

In the current scenario wherein most of the image forgery detection studies attempt to assess whether the image is real or forged in an offline mode, it is crucial to identify any trending or potential forged image as early as possible. By learning from historical data, the proposed framework can aid in early prediction of forged images to detect the newly emerging forged images even before they occur. In summary, the proposed framework has a potential to mitigate physical spreading and psychological impact of forged images on social media.

This study focusses on copy-move and splicing techniques while integrating transfer learning concepts to classify forged images with high accuracy. The synergistic use of hitherto little explored image transformation techniques and customized convolutional neural network helps design a robust image forgery detection framework. Experiments and findings establish that the proposed framework accurately classifies forged images, thus mitigating the negative socio-cultural spread of misinformation.