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History

Overview

The EURO working group on Behavioural OR  was established in January 2017.

For example, we have witnessed the highly attended BOR sessions at IFORS 2014 (Barcelona) and EURO 2015 (Glasgow), as well as the high number of sessions scheduled at the EURO 2016 (Poznan). Indeed, the BOR sessions have run throughout the entire duration of a conference.

In addition, the EJOR Special Issue on BOR, published in March 2016, attracted a high number of submissions. The resulting collection of papers in that issue covered a wide range of behavioural-related topics in OR (e.g. behaviour with models, modelling behaviour), used both experimental and field research methods, and cut across a number of approaches (e.g. decision analysis simulation, forecasting, problem structuring methods, system dynamics, optimisation).

Finally, the BOR website portal was launched, and the first BOR Summer School hosted by Aalto University was successful with excellent feedback from participants. There is also an edited BOR book “Behavioral Operational Research: Theory, Methodology and Practice” from the editors Martin Kunc, Jonathan Malpass, and Leroy White.

Report on the 4th EURO Summer School on Behavioral OR (2024)

The fourth EURO Summer School on Behavioral OR took place on September 16-20 at the Faculty of Business, Economics and Statistics at the University of Vienna. In total, 36 students from 16 countries participated in the summer school.

The course program of the summer school consisted of four modules covering various aspect of behavioral OR. The topics and lecturers of the modules were:

      1. Behavioral Decision Making (Rudolf Vetschera, University of Vienna, Austria)
      2. Decision Neuroscience (Adiel Almeida, Federal University of Pernambuco, Brazil)
      3. Stakeholder involvement and Large Groups (Judith Lienert, EAWAG Zürich, Switzerland)
      4. Group facilitation (Alberto Franco, University of Bristol, UK and Etienne Rouwette, Radboud University, Netherlands)

 

Each module consisted of one to three class units. In addition to these modules, Raimo Hämäläinen (Aalto University, Finland) gave a plenary lecture on “Doing Research and Publishing in BOR”. The detailed program of the Summer School can be found at https://bor.univie.ac.at/summer-school-program/.

Participants in the summer school had to present their own current research either in the form of a “Lightning Talk” or as a poster during a poster session. 18 students selected to give a lightning talk, the other 18 presented a poster. Students also had the opportunity to sign up for a fifteen minute one-to-one mentoring session with one of the lecturers to discuss their research.

Apart from the transfer of scientific knowledge, an important objective of EURO summer schools is to provide a basis for networking of future researchers. The scientific program of the summer school was therefore accompanied by a social program that provided ample opportunities for networking between participants and also with the lecturers. The social program included a welcome reception after the opening ceremony on Monday Sept 16, a farewell meeting at the end of the summer school and a conference dinner on Sept 19. In addition, a walking tour through the historic center of Vienna was offered after the plenary talk on Tuesday afternoon. The tour ended at the House of Music, and interactive museum about music, entrance to the museum was included.

The summer school provided various types of support for the participants. Apart from free participation in the social events and coffee breaks, all participants received a public transport transport ticket for Vienna. The University of Vienna also provided grants to seven students from low income countries by covering their registration fee.

Overall, students were very satisfied with the summer school, as can be concluded by some comments sent after the summer school:

“It was a pleasure to be part of the summer school. I had the opportunity to gain valuable insights and connect with amazing researchers and professors. I am truly grateful for this experience!”

“The summer school was a wonderful experience! The learning was insightful, the social interactions were enriching, and the hospitality was excellent. I truly appreciate all the efforts that went into making it a success.”

“The summer school was an enriching experience, and was an inspiration for my future studies. Also, I found the lectures very useful, and I learned a lot especially during the  lightning talks and poster sessions.”

“I particularly liked the combination of theory and practical application. This was very helpful for experiencing the very factors that we are going to include in our experimental setups.”