METHODS: This survey was conducted in Penang from October 2016 to June 2017. Respondents were those who were ≥18 years. The survey was conducted using a questionnaire which consists of three randomly selected facial pictures, with at least one acne skin and one clear skin picture.
RESULTS: A total of 435 respondents were recruited. Two third of the respondents (76%) suffered or had suffered from acne. The skin was the first thing noticed by 76.1% respondents when viewing pictures with acne compared with 24.8% with clear skin (p <0.05). People with acne were perceived as being unattractive, sad, lonely, distant, unhealthy, disheveled and shy as compared to people with clear skin (p<0.05). People with clear skin were perceived to be healthier, confident, happy, attractive, successful and intelligent (p<0.05). Respondents were more willing to engage socially with people with clear skin rather than those with acne skin. A significantly higher proportion of respondents were likely to hire or vote for those with clear skin as compared to acne skin. People with acne were also perceived to have a lower educational level and poorer leadership quality.
CONCLUSION: The results of this survey showed that there were significantly negative perception and psychological judgement toward individuals with acne vulgaris. These negative impacts may affect social life of the acne sufferers, their prospect of employment and career opportunities.
Methods: A hybrid fuzzy multiple-criteria decision-making (FMCDM) process, consisting of the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) and fuzzy Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (fuzzy TOPSIS) method, is structured to aggregate the different criteria and rank different ELV alternatives in this complicated evaluation. In order to use the most profound knowledge and judgment of a professional expert team, this qualitative assessment highlights the importance of supportive information.
Results: The results obtained indicate that experts have considered the country-specific information as a reliable reference in their decisions. Among different key evaluation criteria in effluent standard setting, the highest experts' priority is "Environmental protection". For both the conventional and toxic pollutants, the influence of all other criteria namely "Economic feasibility", "Technology viability" and "Institutional capacity", as constraining criteria in developing countries, have not reduced the responsibility towards the environmental objectives. In ELVs ranking, experts have made their decisions with respect to the specific characteristics of each pollutant and the existing capacities and constraints of the country, without emphasizing on any specific reference.
Conclusions: This systematic and transparent approach has resulted in defensible country-specific ELVs for the Iron and Steel industry, which can be developed for other sectors. As the main conclusion, this paper demonstrates that FMCDM is a robust tool for this comprehensive assessment especially regarding the data availability limitations in developing countries.