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1 – 10 of over 5000
Article
Publication date: 6 October 2023

Jie Yang, Manman Zhang, Linjian Shangguan and Jinfa Shi

The possibility function-based grey clustering model has evolved into a complete approach for dealing with uncertainty evaluation problems. Existing models still have problems…

Abstract

Purpose

The possibility function-based grey clustering model has evolved into a complete approach for dealing with uncertainty evaluation problems. Existing models still have problems with the choice dilemma of the maximum criteria and instances when the possibility function may not accurately capture the data's randomness. This study aims to propose a multi-stage skewed grey cloud clustering model that blends grey and randomness to overcome these problems.

Design/methodology/approach

First, the skewed grey cloud possibility (SGCP) function is defined, and its digital characteristics demonstrate that a normal cloud is a particular instance of a skewed cloud. Second, the border of the decision paradox of the maximum criterion is established. Third, using the skewed grey cloud kernel weight (SGCKW) transformation as a tool, the multi-stage skewed grey cloud clustering coefficient (SGCCC) vector is calculated and research items are clustered according to this multi-stage SGCCC vector with overall features. Finally, the multi-stage skewed grey cloud clustering model's solution steps are then provided.

Findings

The results of applying the model to the assessment of college students' capacity for innovation and entrepreneurship revealed that, in comparison to the traditional grey clustering model and the two-stage grey cloud clustering evaluation model, the proposed model's clustering results have higher identification and stability, which partially resolves the decision paradox of the maximum criterion.

Originality/value

Compared with current models, the proposed model in this study can dynamically depict the clustering process through multi-stage clustering, ensuring the stability and integrity of the clustering results and advancing grey system theory.

Details

Grey Systems: Theory and Application, vol. 14 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2043-9377

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 26 November 2019

Dang Luo, Manman Zhang and Huihui Zhang

The purpose of this paper is to establish a two-stage grey cloud clustering model to assess the drought risk level of 18 prefecture-level cities in Henan Province.

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to establish a two-stage grey cloud clustering model to assess the drought risk level of 18 prefecture-level cities in Henan Province.

Design/methodology/approach

The clustering process is divided into two stages. In the first stage, grey cloud clustering coefficient vectors are obtained by grey cloud clustering. In the second stage, with the help of the weight kernel clustering function, the general representation of the weight vector group of kernel clustering is given. And a new coefficient vector of kernel clustering that integrates the support factors of the adjacent components was obtained in this stage. The entropy resolution coefficient of grey cloud clustering coefficient vector is set as the demarcation line of the two stages, and a two-stage grey cloud clustering model, which combines grey and randomness, is proposed.

Findings

This paper demonstrates that 18 cities in Henan Province are divided into five categories, which are in accordance with five drought hazard levels. And the rationality and validity of this model is illustrated by comparing with other methods.

Practical implications

This paper provides a practical and effective new method for drought risk assessment and, then, provides theoretical support for the government and production departments to master drought information and formulate disaster prevention and mitigation measures.

Originality/value

The model in this paper not only solves the problem that the result and the rule of individual subjective judgment are always inconsistent owing to not fully considering the randomness of the possibility function, but also solves the problem that it’s difficult to ascertain the attribution of decision objects, when several components of grey clustering coefficient vector tend to be balanced. It provides a new idea for the development of the grey clustering model. The rationality and validity of the model are illustrated by taking 18 cities in Henan Province as examples.

Details

Grey Systems: Theory and Application, vol. 10 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2043-9377

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 9 March 2021

Dang Luo, Yan Hu and Decai Sun

The purpose of this paper is to establish a grey cloud incidence clustering model to assess the drought disaster degree under 15 indexes in 18 cities of Henan province.

156

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to establish a grey cloud incidence clustering model to assess the drought disaster degree under 15 indexes in 18 cities of Henan province.

Design/methodology/approach

The grey incidence degree between each index and ideal index is used to determine the index weight and combined with the subjective weight, the comprehensive weight is given; the traditional possibility function is transformed into grey cloud possibility function by using the principle of maximum deviation and maximum entropy, which fully reflects the coexistence of multiple decision-making conclusions and constructs the grey cloud incidence clustering model.

Findings

The drought disaster degree of Henan province is divided into four grades under the selected 15 indexes. The drought grades show obvious regional differences. The risk levels of the east and southwest are higher, and the risk levels of the north and southeast are lower. This result is consistent with the study of drought disaster grades in Henan province, which shows the practicability and usefulness of the model.

Practical implications

It provides an effective method for the assessment of drought disaster grade and the basis for formulating disaster prevention and mitigation plan.

Originality/value

By studying the method of multiattribute and multistage decision-making with interval grey number information. The objective weight model of index value is designed, and the subjective weight is given by experts. On the basis of the two, the comprehensive weight of subjective and objective combination is proposed, which effectively weakens the randomness of subjective weight and reasonably reflects the practicality of index decision-making. The time weight reflects the dynamic of the index. The traditional possibility function is transformed into the grey cloud possibility function, which effectively takes advantage of the grey cloud model in dealing with the coexistence of fuzzy information, grey information and random information. Thus, the conflict between the decision-making results and the objective reality is effectively solved. The interval grey number can make full use of the effective information and improve the accuracy of the actual information.

Details

Grey Systems: Theory and Application, vol. 12 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2043-9377

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 29 July 2014

Yong Liu and Huan-huan Zhao

– The purpose of this paper is to construct a dynamic information aggregation decision-making model based on variable precision rough set.

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to construct a dynamic information aggregation decision-making model based on variable precision rough set.

Design/methodology/approach

To deal with the dynamic decision-making problems, the grey relational analysis method, grey fixed weight clustering based on the centre triangle whitening weight function and maximum entropy principle is used to establish the dynamic information aggregation decision-making model based on variable precision rough set. The method, to begin with, the grey relational analysis method is used to determine the attributes weights of each stage; taking the proximity of the attribute measurement value and positive and negative desired effect value and the uncertainty of time weight into account, a multi-objective optimisation model based on maximum entropy principle is established to solve the model with Lagrange multiplier method, so that time weights expression are acquired; what is more, the decision-making attribute is obtained by grey fixed weight clustering based on the centre triangle whitening weight function, so that multi-decision-making table with dynamic characteristics is established, and then probabilistic decision rules from multi-criteria decision table are derived by applying variable precision rough set. Finally, a decision-making model validates the feasibility and effectiveness of the model.

Findings

The results show that it the proposed model can well aggregate the multi-stage dynamic decision-making information, realise the extraction of decision-making rules.

Research limitations/implications

The method exposed in the paper can be used to deal with the decision-making problems with the multi-stage dynamic characteristics, and decision-making attributes contain noise data and the attribute values are interval grey numbers.

Originality/value

The paper succeeds in realising both the aggregation of dynamic decision-making information and the extraction of decision-making rules.

Details

Grey Systems: Theory and Application, vol. 4 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2043-9377

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 25 January 2013

Jianghong Yu, Daping Wang and Chengwu Hu

The purpose of the paper is to propose a novel approach, based on grey clustering decision, to fill in an omission of quantitative monitoring parameter selection methods.

243

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of the paper is to propose a novel approach, based on grey clustering decision, to fill in an omission of quantitative monitoring parameter selection methods.

Design/methodology/approach

The basic monitoring parameter selection criteria and the corresponding calculation methods are presented. Then, the grey clustering decision model for monitoring parameter optimization selection is constructed, and an integrated weight determination method based on analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and information entropy is provided.

Findings

Basic principle for monitoring parameter selection is proposed and quantitative description is carried out for selection principle in engineering application. Grey clustering decision‐making model for monitoring parameter optimization selection is established. Comprehensive weight ascertainment method based on AHP and information entropy is provided to make the index weight more scientific.

Practical implications

At system design stage, it is of significance to carry out selection and optimization of monitoring parameters. After the optimization of monitoring parameters is confirmed, measurability analysis and design in parallel are carried out for convenience of timely information feedback and system design revision. Therefore, the system integration efficiency is improved and the cost of research and manufacturing is reduced.

Originality/value

Monitoring parameter optimization selection process based on grey clustering decision‐making model is described and the analysis result shows that the proposed method has certain degree of effectiveness, rationality and universality.

Article
Publication date: 9 August 2022

Bingjun Li, Shuhua Zhang, Wenyan Li and Yifan Zhang

Grey modeling technique is an important element of grey system theory, and academic articles applied to agricultural science research have been published since 1985, proving the…

Abstract

Purpose

Grey modeling technique is an important element of grey system theory, and academic articles applied to agricultural science research have been published since 1985, proving the broad applicability and effectiveness of the technique from different aspects and providing a new means to solve agricultural science problems. The analysis of the connotation and trend of the application of grey modeling technique in agricultural science research contributes to the enrichment of grey technique and the development of agricultural science in multiple dimensions.

Design/methodology/approach

Based on the relevant literature selected from China National Knowledge Infrastructure, the Web of Science, SpiScholar and other databases in the past 37 years (1985–2021), this paper firstly applied the bibliometric method to quantitatively visualize and systematically analyze the trend of publication, productive author, productive institution, and highly cited literature. Then, the literature is combed by the application of different grey modeling techniques in agricultural science research, and the literature research progress is systematically analyzed.

Findings

The results show that grey model technology has broad prospects in the field of agricultural science research. Agricultural universities and research institutes are the main research forces in the application of grey model technology in agricultural science research, and have certain inheritance. The application of grey model technology in agricultural science research has wide applicability and precise practicability.

Originality/value

By analyzing and summarizing the application trend of grey model technology in agricultural science research, the research hotspot, research frontier and valuable research directions of grey model technology in agricultural science research can be more clearly grasped.

Details

Grey Systems: Theory and Application, vol. 12 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2043-9377

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 7 November 2016

Jianghui Xin

With the improvement of economic level, car ownership is growing, and the number of scrapped automobiles is increasing. Therefore, evaluation research for auto parts…

6227

Abstract

Purpose

With the improvement of economic level, car ownership is growing, and the number of scrapped automobiles is increasing. Therefore, evaluation research for auto parts remanufacturing is particularly important. The purpose of this paper is to construct the evaluation index system of auto parts remanufacturing and research the grey clustering theory. The grey fixed weight clustering evaluation is used to evaluate automobile engine remanufacturability.

Design/methodology/approach

According to the policies and regulations of China about remanufacturing, economic, technical, resources, energy and the environment, four indexes are selected to set up the evaluation standard of auto parts remanufacturing scheme. Grey fixed weight clustering method is used to evaluate remanufacturability of the auto parts. Firstly, number index and grey determine the whitenization weight function, then based on the clustering weight of each index, the clustering coefficient matrix is calculated. Finally, the class that certain object belongs to, according to the clustering coefficient matrix is determined.

Findings

Results show that constructed indexes of auto parts remanufacturing scheme can be used for effective evaluation. And the proposed fixed weight grey cluster model can aggregate all indexes information well. Therefore, the proposed indexes and model in this paper are effective and can be used for auto parts remanufacturing.

Practical implications

According to the requirements of the current situation in China, this paper puts forward a method based on grey clustering decision, to evaluate different auto parts remanufacturing schemes, for manufacturing enterprises to provide theoretical basis for remanufacturing production, in order to realize the reasonable configuration of resources.

Originality/value

This paper firstly establishes the evaluation index system of auto parts remanufacturing, the grey clustering theory is introduced into the evaluation of remanufacturing. The fixed-weight grey cluster model is proposed to aggregate indexes’ information.

Details

Grey Systems: Theory and Application, vol. 6 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2043-9377

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 6 November 2019

Dang Luo and Zhang Huihui

The purpose of this paper is to propose a grey clustering model based on kernel and information field to deal with the situation in which both the observation values and the…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to propose a grey clustering model based on kernel and information field to deal with the situation in which both the observation values and the turning points of the whitenization weight function are interval grey numbers.

Design/methodology/approach

First, the “unreduced axiom of degree of greyness” was expanded to obtain the inference of “information field not-reducing”. Then, based on the theoretical basis of inference, the expression of whitenization weight function with interval grey number was provided. The grey clustering model and fuzzy clustering model were compared to analyse the relationship and difference between the two models. Finally, the paper model and the fuzzy clustering model were applied to the example analysis, and the interval grey number clustering model was established to analyse the influencing factors of regional drought disaster risk in Henan Province.

Findings

The example analysis results illustrate that although the two clustering methods have different theoretical basis, they are suitable for dealing with complex systems with uncertainty or grey characteristic, solving the problem of incomplete system information, which has certain feasibility and rationality. The clustering results of case study show that five influencing factors of regional drought disaster risk in Henan Province are divided into three classes, consistent with the actual situation, and they show the validity and practicability of the clustering model.

Originality/value

The paper proposes a new whitenization weight function with interval grey number that can transform interval grey number operations into real number operations. It not only simplifies the calculation steps, but it has a great significance for the “small data sets and poor information” grey system and has a universal applicability.

Details

Grey Systems: Theory and Application, vol. 10 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2043-9377

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 3 December 2021

Tooraj Karimi and Yalda Yahyazade

Risk management is one of the most influential parts of project management that has a major impact on the success or failure of projects. Due to the increasing use of information…

Abstract

Purpose

Risk management is one of the most influential parts of project management that has a major impact on the success or failure of projects. Due to the increasing use of information technology in all fields and the high failure rate of software development projects, it is essential to predict the risk level of each project effectively before starting. Therefore, the main purpose of this paper is proposing an expert system to infer about the risk of new banking software development project.

Design/methodology/approach

In this research, the risk of software developing projects is considered from four dimensions including risk of cost deviation, time deviation, quality deviation and scope deviation, which is examined by rough set theory (RST). The most important variables affecting the cost, time, quality and scope of projects are identified as condition attributes and four initial decision systems are constructed. Grey system theory is used to cluster the condition attributes and after data discretizing, eight rule models for each dimension of risk as a decision attribute are extracted using RST. The most validated model for each decision attribute is selected as an inference engine of the expert system, and finally a simple user interface is designed in order to predict the risk level of any new project by inserting the data of project attributes

Findings

In this paper, a high accuracy expert system is designed based on the combination of the grey clustering method and rough set modeling to predict the risks of each project before starting. Cross-validation of different rule models shows that the best model for determining cost deviation is Manual/Jonson/ORR model, and the most validated models for predicting the risk of time, quality and scope of projects are Entropy/Genetic/ORR, Manual/Genetic/FOR and Entropy/Genetic/ORR models; all of which are more than 90% accurate

Research limitations/implications

It is essential to gather data of previous cases to design a validated expert system. Since data documentation in the field of software development projects is not complete enough, grey set theory (GST) and RST are combined to improve the validity of the rule model. The proposed expert system can be used for risk assessment of new banking software projects

Originality/value

The risk assessment of software developing projects based on RST is a new approach in the field of risk management. Furthermore, using the grey clustering for combining the condition attributes is a novel solution for improving the accuracy of the rule models.

Details

Grey Systems: Theory and Application, vol. 12 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2043-9377

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 February 2016

Sifeng Liu, Yingjie Yang, Naiming Xie and Jeffrey Forrest

The purpose of this paper is to summarize the progress in grey system research during 2000-2015, so as to present some important new concepts, models, methods and a new framework…

1808

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to summarize the progress in grey system research during 2000-2015, so as to present some important new concepts, models, methods and a new framework of grey system theory.

Design/methodology/approach

The new thinking, new models and new methods of grey system theory and their applications are presented in this paper. It includes algorithm rules of grey numbers based on the “kernel” and the degree of greyness of grey numbers, the concept of general grey numbers, the synthesis axiom of degree of greyness of grey numbers and their operations; the general form of buffer operators of grey sequence operators; the four basic models of grey model GM(1,1), such as even GM, original difference GM, even difference GM, discrete GM and the suitable sequence type of each basic model, and suitable range of most used grey forecasting models; the similarity degree of grey incidences, the closeness degree of grey incidences and the three-dimensional absolute degree of grey incidence of grey incidence analysis models; the grey cluster model based on center-point and end-point mixed triangular whitenization functions; the multi-attribute intelligent grey target decision model, the two stages decision model with grey synthetic measure of grey decision models; grey game models, grey input-output models of grey combined models; and the problems of robust stability for grey stochastic time-delay systems of neutral type, distributed-delay type and neutral distributed-delay type of grey control, etc. And the new framework of grey system theory is given as well.

Findings

The problems which remain for further studying are discussed at the end of each section. The reader could know the general picture of research and developing trend of grey system theory from this paper.

Practical implications

A lot of successful practical applications of the new models to solve various problems have been found in many different areas of natural science, social science and engineering, including spaceflight, civil aviation, information, metallurgy, machinery, petroleum, chemical industry, electrical power, electronics, light industries, energy resources, transportation, medicine, health, agriculture, forestry, geography, hydrology, seismology, meteorology, environment protection, architecture, behavioral science, management science, law, education, military science, etc. These practical applications have brought forward definite and noticeable social and economic benefits. It demonstrates a wide range of applicability of grey system theory, especially in the situation where the available information is incomplete and the collected data are inaccurate.

Originality/value

The reader is given a general picture of grey systems theory as a new model system and a new framework for studying problems where partial information is known; especially for uncertain systems with few data points and poor information. The problems remaining for further studying are identified at the end of each section.

Details

Grey Systems: Theory and Application, vol. 6 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2043-9377

Keywords

1 – 10 of over 5000