Observing how opinions are diffused, exchanged, and converged within a group is an important topic that can lead to the discovery of conditions for the diffusion of certain opinions and the discovery of efficient convergence processes. In management engineering, this is also an important topic that could lead to the discovery of effective advertising methods and ways to reverse popularity in the market. One such model for elucidating the opinion formation process within a group is called the naming game (NG) model. The NG model attempts to capture the consensus process of the entire network through the repetition of individual local communication. In this study, we propose a naming game model that introduces the mere exposure effect and investigate the influence of the mere exposure effect on community opinion formation through simulation. By introducing rules for deciding the words to be sent based on the liking and the increase value of liking in the mere exposure effect, and by investigating the impact of these rules, we aim to discover the influence of the mere exposure effect on the opinion formation of the community.

Recently, battery swapping has gained attention as a method for replenishing energy in Electric Vehicles (EVs). It is a new technology that replaces the discharged batteries with charged ones at swap stations and can overcome the problem of the long charging times for EVs. However, in order to promote the spread of EVs that use the battery swapping method, there are many issues such as the development of battery technology, the regulation of battery standards, and securing swapping facilities. In particular, almost no research has been done on the locations for battery swapping facilities in comparison to those for the existing battery charging method, and it will be an important research theme in the future. Furthermore, accompanying the spread of EVs, it is expected that the number of gas stations, which are indispensable for gasoline vehicles, will continue to decrease. This invites the problem of loss of economic viability in the local community. In order to cope with the above problem, this paper proposes a multi-objective facility location model that considers existing gas stations as candidate sites for EV battery swapping facilities. For this purpose, the facility location problem is formulated as a multi objective optimization problem that simultaneously considers the installation cost and the economic viability of the local community, and provides an effective solution. Furthermore, its effectiveness as a support model for decision-making in multi-objective facility location problems is verified through numerical experiments.

Even though most machines installed in job-shops are equipped with automatic processing functions, there are cases in which manual processing by workers is also partially required. The working hours for these workers include break times. Manual processing cannot be performed during a break, but automatic processing can continue. A local search method incorporating genetic operations focusing on a block on the critical path is proposed to obtain the shortest makespan schedule in such an environment. In addition, this paper develops a mixed integer programming model (MIP) for exact optimization. In numerical experiments, the developed MIP obtained the optimal solution in one problem instance of ten machines and ten jobs. The proposed method found one optimal solution in ten trials. For problem instances of 15 machines and 15 jobs, the MIP model could not find optimal solutions in all instances within 24 hours of computation. A genetic algorithm (GA)-based optimization was also applied to these ten instances. The proposed method found better solutions than the best solutions by MIP in six instances by conducting ten trials. The proposed method was also superior to the GA-based approximate optimization method.

The market size for painting work at construction sites is expanding. On the other hand, painting work involves many risks, such as accidents caused by falling tiles on exterior walls, and labor shortages have become chronic. In addition, the criteria for determining whether the appearance quality of a job has passed or failed are now determined on an individual basis, and as a result, the workload of painters is increasing due to differences in their skills and abilities These circumstances make it necessary to review the conventional work methods of painters and liberate them from the arduous labor. This study investigates the criteria for judging appearance quality to determine the optimum conditions for architectural coating work using a managerial engineering approach.