ANALYSIS OF UNCERTAINTY IN A CONSTRUCTION PROJECT

This article presents the analysis of uncertainty and effectiveness in cost to construction project. Theoretical part describes various definitions of uncertainty, risk both with there sources as calculation bias, information ambiguity and data inaccuracy in construction projects. Main analysis is connected with the project's appraisal phase and its stages were the detailed information is the crucial factor for correct decision- making procedures under uncertainty and risk. Consequently this article is presenting various types risk what are undistinguishable from uncertainty circumstances in construction. After the description of risk and uncertainty types list of solutions were prepared. Application of the suggested risk and uncertainty extenuating techniques in practice was shown as analysis of precision and bias dependence with available information at different stages of appraisal phase.It is emphasized on uncertainty and risk management problem in the construction's decision- making. Recently methods based on the utility theory, game theory, statistical distribution and probability, were improved and adjusted due to decision-making needs in construction. That is why the model with implemented multiple-criteria approaches is suggested both as a tool for dealing with the uncertainty and risk problems and to meet the needs of project managers in appraisal phase.

Modeling Skin Conductance Response Time Series during Consecutive Rapid Decision-Making under Concurrent Temporal Pressure and Information Ambiguity

Emergency situations promote risk-taking behaviors associated with anxiety reactivity. A previous study using the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) has demonstrated that prespecified state anxiety predicts moderate risk-taking (middle-risk/high-return) after salient penalty events under temporal pressure and information ambiguity. Such moderate risk-taking can be used as a behavioral background in the case of fraud damage. We conducted two psychophysiological experiments using the IGT and used a psychophysiological modeling approach to examine how moderate risk-taking under temporal pressure and information ambiguity is associated with automatic physiological responses, such as a skin conductance response (SCR). The first experiment created template SCR functions under concurrent temporal pressure and information ambiguity. The second experiment produced a convolution model using the SCR functions and fitted the model to the SCR time series recorded under temporal pressure and no temporal pressure, respectively. We also collected the participants’ anxiety profiles before the IGT experiment. The first finding indicated that participants with higher state anxiety scores yielded better model fitting (that is, event-related physiological responses) under temporal pressure. The second finding demonstrated that participants with better model fitting made consecutive Deck A selections under temporal pressure more frequently. In summary, a psychophysiological modeling approach is effective for capturing overlapping SCRs and moderate risk-taking under concurrent temporal pressure and information ambiguity is associated with automatic physiological and emotional reactivity.

Embodied Loss and the Psychophysiological Effects of Pain Examined With Traditional and New Behavioral Measures

Based on a robust decision phenomenon of loss aversion, people are distinctly more sensitive to losses than to gains. The psychological pain experienced due to a loss is greater than the pleasure experienced due to a gain of the same amount. We argue that physical pain can be viewed as a psychological loss with diminishing sensitivity. Pain thus would be preferred summed rather than distributed. The results from 89 student-participants recruited from a public university in the Midwest US revealed that chronic pain is correlated with reduced subjective life expectancy and increased impulsivity. We found a significant propensity to prefer sharp-and-shorter pain to milder-and-longer pain. The loss-aversion score predicted this propensity in pain management. We developed a new behavioral measure of Band-Aid removal as a predictor for pain duration-intensity tradeoff. The higher the Band-Aid removal time, the higher the preference for higher-duration and lower intensity, and the lower willingness to seek medical attention for pain. The participants also revealed a higher willingness to seek medical help for generalized pain than localized pain to reduce information ambiguity.

Environmental Policy Making in Supply Chains under Ambiguity and Competition: A Fuzzy Stackelberg Game Approach

Despite the substantial efforts of governments in promoting sustainable development, there exists considerable debate regarding the environmental policy making approach under information ambiguity and competition. This study investigates market competition between a green and a non-green supply chain (SC) under two government regulation policies, namely, selling price and production quantities. To tackle the policy making challenges, a fuzzy game theoretical model was employed in a centralized and decentralized SC setting. The results revealed that SCs always achieve a higher expected profit under a decentralized structure, regardless of the type of the governments intervention policy. Also, the government’s policy making success was found to be highly dependent on the channel leadership, market competition, and the SC structure. Our findings suggest that the policy makers’ objectives in reducing environmental pollution and increasing revenue are highly achievable, without risk of losing channel coordination and maximum level of efficiency.

Social Reality Formation in Media Discourse: Information Ambiguity Strategy

Modern media have become an important ideological tool in conveying and forming a certain view of the world and attitude towards it. While complying with the interests of the power structures, they shape public opinion by means of increasingly sophisticated media technologies and techniques. The article introduces multilevel means of creating ambiguity of a media text: verbs with the semantic component 'without proof', lexical units with semantics of uncertainty, means of expressing epistemic modality, interrogative headings, etc. The regular use of these means observed in the media enables the author to consider ambiguity as one efficient strategy of public opinion manipulation. The data for the study were obtained from quality British and American newspapers and news websites that cover events related to Russia. By using the methods of linguistic pragmatics and sociolinguistics as well as critical discourse analysis, it was proved that the ambiguity is a widely spread method in modern media, it enables journalists to write about unconfirmed facts and introduce a certain attitude towards them into the minds of the audience without bearing any responsibility for unsubstantiated information.