A review of the application of acoustic emission technique in engineering
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- Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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- v.54 no.6
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- pp.1075-1095
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- 2015
The use of acoustic emission (AE) technique for detecting and monitoring damages and the progress on damages in different structures is widely used and has earned a reputation as one of the most reliable and well-established technique in non-destructive testing (NDT). Acoustic Emission is a very efficient and effective technology used for fracture behavior and fatigue detection in metals, fiberglass, wood, composites, ceramics, concrete and plastics. It can also be used for detecting faults and pressure leaks in vessels, tanks, pipes, as well as for monitoring the progression of corrosion in welding. This paper reviews major research developments over the past few years in application of acoustic emission in numerous engineering fields, including manufacturing, civil, aerospace and material engineering.
There is a tradeoff between user's privacy and utility of context-aware services in ubiquitous computing environments. Many privacy models have been proposed to support the disclosure of personal information at different levels of detail, in ubiquitous computing environments. However, most of these models do not allow for explicit criteria to assess the benefit users are likely to reap by disclosing their personal information. In this paper, we propose an automated decision making mechanism that evaluates the "benefit of disclosure" for the users based on trust relationships between users and information requesters and manages the disclosure of user's personal information accordingly. Unlike other trust models, we do not regard the reputation of an information requester as sufficient to determine his/her trustworthiness. Instead, we represent trustworthiness as a function of information requester's reputation in the eyes of the user and his/her competence in a given context. To validate our mechanism, we apply it to context-aware healthcare application that monitors physiological condition of a user.
The purpose of this study is to explore the measurement of attitude towards science based on social constructivism and the application of this scale. The data were collected using questionnaires from 833 middle school students in the second grade. First, factor analysis were used to assess the construct validity of the scale of Reputation in Culture Border Crossings (R-CBC) developed by Krogh and Thomsen (2005). This finding indicated the construct validity of R-CBC scale based on social constructivism. Second, the correlation among two scales based on social constructivism and Test of Science-Related Attitudes (TOSRA) scale based on individual constructivism were investigated to examine the convergent validity and the discriminant validity. The R-CBC scale was correlated with Simpson-Troost Attitude Questionnaire (STAQ) scale but the R-CBC scale and TOSRA scale were not connected. Third, students' attitude toward science assessed by three forms of measurements were compared according to the choice of high school type. Students' attitude toward science measured by R-CBC scale and STAQ scale were different in three types of high school. This finding indicated that two scales based on social constructivism are useful measurements that can predict the choice of high school type.
Introduction As consumers' purchase behavior change into a rational and practical direction, the discount store industry came to have keen competition along with rapid external growth. Therefore as a solution, distribution businesses are concentrating on developing PB(Private Brand) which can realize differentiation and profitability at the same time. And as improvement in customer loyalty beyond customer satisfaction is effective in surviving in an environment with keen competition, PB is being used as a strategic tool to improve customer loyalty. To improve loyalty among PB users, it is necessary to develop PB by examining properties of a customer group, first of all, quality level perceived by consumers should be met to obtain customer satisfaction and customer trust and consequently induce customer loyalty. To provide results of systematic analysis on relations between antecedents influenced perceived quality and variables affecting customer loyalty, this study proposed a research model based on causal relations verified in prior researches and set 16 hypotheses about relations among 9 theoretical variables. Data was collected from 400 adult customers residing in Seoul and the Metropolitan area and using large scale discount stores, among them, 375 copies were analyzed using SPSS 15.0 and Amos 7.0. The findings of the present study followed as; We ascertained that the higher company reputation, brand reputation, product experience and brand familiarity, the higher perceived quality. The study also examined the higher perceived quality, the higher customer satisfaction, customer trust and customer loyalty. The findings showed that the higher customer satisfaction and customer trust, the higher customer loyalty. As for moderating effects between PB and NB in terms of influences of perceived quality factors on perceived quality, we can ascertain that PB was higher than NB in the influences of company reputation on perceived quality while NB was higher than PB in the influences of brand reputation and brand familiarity on perceived quality. These results of empirical analysis will be useful for those concerned to do marketing activities based on a clearer understanding of antecedents and consecutive factors influenced perceived quality. At last, discussions about academical and managerial implications in these results, we suggested the limitations of this study and the future research directions. Research Model and Hypotheses Test After analyzing if antecedent variables having influence on perceived quality shows any difference between PB and NB in terms of their influences on them, the relation between variables that have influence on customer loyalty was determined as Figure 1. We established 16 hypotheses to test and hypotheses are as follows; H1-1: Perceived price has a positive effect on perceived quality. H1-2: It is expected that PB and NB would have different influence in terms of perceived price on perceived quality. H2-1: Company reputation has a positive effect on perceived quality. H2-2: It is expected that PB and NB would have different influence in terms of company reputation on perceived quality. H3-1: Brand reputation has a positive effect on perceived quality. H3-2: It is expected that PB and NB would have different influence in terms of brand reputation on perceived quality. H4-1: Product experience has a positive effect on perceived quality. H4-2: It is expected that PB and NB would have different influence in terms of product experience on perceived quality. H5-1: Brand familiarity has a positive effect on perceived quality. H5-2: It is expected that PB and NB would have different influence in terms of brand familiarity on perceived quality. H6: Perceived quality has a positive effect on customer satisfaction. H7: Perceived quality has a positive effect on customer trust. H8: Perceived quality has a positive effect on customer loyalty. H9: Customer satisfaction has a positive effect on customer trust. H10: Customer satisfaction has a positive effect on customer loyalty. H11: Customer trust has a positive effect on customer loyalty. Results from analyzing main effects of research model is shown as