This study investigates how abnormally hot temperatures affect firms’ environmental behaviors in China. We find that firms exposed to abnormally hot temperatures participate in more environmental engagement. We also find that this improvement effect is driven mainly by environmental concerns, including public concerns, CEOs, and governments. Our results remain intact after an array of robustness tests. Further analysis shows that the effect of abnormally hot temperatures on corporate environmental engagement is more pronounced in SOEs, heavily polluting firms, and firms located (...) closer to local environmental protection agencies. Based on the political pressure channel, our results indicate that the improvement effect is more prominent in politically connected firms, cities where local officials can wield more influence, local governments have larger financial slack, and local governments disclose their environmental targets. Moreover, the positive impact of environmental engagement on firm value is stronger when firms are exposed to abnormally hot temperatures. Overall, this study sheds light on the potential stimulation of firms’ environmental actions by global warming, which is yet to be fully understood. (shrink)

​I use network models to simulate social learning situations in which the dominant group ignores or devalues testimony from the marginalized group. I find that the marginalized group ends up with several epistemic advantages due to testimonial ignoration and devaluation. The results provide one possible explanation for a key claim of standpoint epistemology, the inversion thesis, by casting it as a consequence of another key claim of the theory, the unidirectional failure of testimonial reciprocity. Moreover, the results complicate the understanding (...) and application of previously discovered network epistemology effects, notably the Zollman effect (Zollman 2007, 2010). (shrink)

I analyze the role of infinite idealizations used in the renormalization group (RG hereafter) method in explaining universality across microscopically different physical systems in critical phenomena. I argue that despite the reference to infinite limit systems such as systems with infinite correlation lengths during the RG process, the key to explaining universality in critical phenomena need not involve infinite limit systems. I develop my argument by introducing what I regard as the explanatorily relevant property in RG explanations: linearization* property; I (...) then motivate and prove a proposition about the linearization* property in support of my view. As a result, infinite limit systems in RG explanations are dispensable. (shrink)

Purpose - The high-speed growth of China’s large-scale new economy indicates that innovation has become the most important economic growth pole. The purpose of this paper is to explore the structure and antecedents of the path to innovation, in which we focus on revealing the mediating effect of organizational character. Design/methodology/approach - Considering the indigenous context of China’s new economy, our research divides the innovation into two types: technological innovation and business model innovation. Then, we build a path model to (...) achieve innovation by taking intellectual capital and organizational character as antecedents. Finally, we use structural equation method to measure the path model on the basis of sample data collected by a questionnaire survey. Findings - The results indicate that intellectual capital has a significant positive direct effect on technological innovation, while its direct effect on business model innovation is not significant. As for indirect effects, organization character not only mediate the beneficial effect of intellectual capital on technological innovation, but also mediate the beneficial effect of intellectual capital on business model innovation. In addition, technological innovation is positively affecting business model innovation, and it plays an intermediary role in the path of intellectual capital to business model innovation. Originality/value - This study takes intellectual capital and organizational character as the common antecedents of innovation and breaks down the content of innovation research into technological innovation and business model innovation. Thus, it has established a brand new theoretical analysis framework of dual innovation and enriched the innovation theory. This theoretical framework has important explanatory power for revealing the technological innovation and business model innovation activities carried out by a large number of corporate organizations in the context of China's new economy and the resulting economic boom. Furthermore, it would enlighten new economic organizations to organize innovation activities more effectively and achieve better innovation performance. (shrink)

Diversity of practice is widely recognized as crucial to scientific progress. If all scientists perform the same tests in their research, they might miss important insights that other tests would yield. If all scientists adhere to the same theories, they might fail to explore other options which, in turn, might be superior. But the mechanisms that lead to this sort of diversity can also generate epistemic harms when scientific communities fail to reach swift consensus on successful theories. In this paper, (...) we draw on extant literature using network models to investigate diversity in science. We evaluate different mechanisms from the modeling literature that can promote transient diversity of practice, keeping in mind ethical and practical constraints posed by real epistemic communities. We ask: what are the best ways to promote an appropriate amount of diversity of practice in scientific communities? (shrink)

When solving a complex problem in a group, should group members always choose the best available solution that they are aware of? In this paper, I build simulation models to show that, perhaps surprisingly, a group of agents who individually randomly follow a better available solution than their own can end up outperforming a group of agents who individually always follow the best available solution. This result has implications for the feminist philosophy of science and social epistemology.

Cross-sector relationship building is an important strategy in corporate social responsibility initiatives, and communicating cross-sector relationships on social media can help raise the visibility of collaborative relationships. A noticeable gap in the literature is how social media enables and constrains the formation patterns of cross-sector connections. To understand how businesses communicate their relationships with government agencies and nonprofits about social issues on social media, we propose a theoretical framework that centers public attention as a critical resource and considers different sectors' (...) interests in the COVID-19 issue. We tested this framework with a nationally representative sample of 1,980 organizations on Twitter. The analysis reveals that the increase in public attention to the COVID-19 issue was accompanied by a greater likelihood of cross-sector ties. Specifically, firms severely affected by COVID-19 were more likely to build ties with government agencies, and the increase in public attention also drove firms to build more ties with nonprofits, especially advocacy nonprofits. Our findings suggest managers of social media communication should observe the volatile public attention and design communicative strategies accordingly. (shrink)

Green entrepreneurial self-efficacy refers to individuals’ conviction that they can contribute to solving environmental issues and shows self-assurance in their efforts to protect the environment. The present investigation attempts to determine the role of employees’ green ESE in the green innovation of SMEs. It is also proposed that GI positively impacts organizational environmental, economic, and social performance. This study also evaluates the mediating role of GI and moderating role of the green knowledge-sharing culture. This study tested the hypothesis using a (...) partial least squares structural equation modeling by applying smart PLS software. A total of 289 employees from SMEs in China were targeted for data collection. The results confirmed that green ESE positively impacts GI. Additionally, the findings verified that GI positively enhances firms’ environmental, economic, and social performance. The results validate the mediating role of GI. The moderating results revealed that green knowledge-sharing culture does not play a moderating role in proposed relationships. This study serves the existing body of literature by providing empirical evidence on the significance of green ESE. The study outcomes highlighted the bridging role of employees’ green ESE for firms’ GI. The results also offer companies a road map for how staff members’ green ESE might help the businesses to improve their performance in terms of the environment, economy, and society. (shrink)

本书阐述了党政干部职业道德建设的重大意义,对党政干部的基本道德规范进行了详尽的论述,同时指出了党政干部职业道德培养和教育的途径和方法。.

People frequently judge how they are viewed by others during social interactions. These judgments are called metaperceptions. This study investigates the relationship between eagerness to determine the evaluation of others and metaperceptions. We propose that eagerness, which reflects approach motivation, induces positive emotions. We apply feelings-as-information theory and hypothesize that positive emotions cause optimistic self-evaluations and metaperceptions. Participants in three studies interact with judges during a singing contest (Study 1), a speech (Study 2), and an interview (Study 3). Results corroborate (...) that eagerness to learn the evaluation of others is overall related to optimistically biased metaperceptions. This effect is mediated sequentially by positive emotions, optimistic self-evaluations, and increased metaperceptions. (shrink)

‘Ethics first’ reform in China significantly changes the governance framework for the research of emerging technologies. The misapplication of human genome editing technology reflects the urgent need to reform the governance framework. Strengthening ethics governance in medical research has become a consensus in China, where legal and ethical reforms are proceeding in parallel. The protection of human dignity, the prevention of biosafety risks, as well as the regulation of technological crimes are at the core of the legal system, which has (...) been embodied in numerous fundamental legislations following the CRISPR-babies incident. Establishing a national ethics committee to coordinate ethics governance, and reinforcing ethics review and external oversight are significant steps in ethical reform. Essentially, ethics governance requires implementing the basic concept of ‘ethics first’, focusing on forward-looking and preventive governance rather than delayed intervention, while maintaining openness and collaboration. (shrink)

Live stream platforms have transformed the production and consumption of music, allowing KPop music to expand globally. Successful KPop idols are contrasted with large numbers of retired KPop performers, some of whom live in undesirable conditions. Drawing on the attachment theory, loyalty theory, and parasocial interaction theory, this study focuses on a unique group, comeback KPop performers, to examine how they acquire empathetic attachment and sustained loyalty from audiences through live stream shows, and the antecedents of these two variables. Answering (...) these questions seems important because comeback KPop performers have to interact with audiences without the financial and marketing support from entertainment agencies. The structural equation modeling of 288 responses from 176 Chinese and 112 Korean KPop audiences confirmed that empathetic attachment and sustained loyalty are positively associated with audience purchase intentions; sustained attractiveness and parasocial interactions function as antecedents of these two factors. The findings shed light on the comeback KPop performers who co-create value with audiences through live stream platforms, with theoretical contributions to the three theories mentioned above and managerial suggestions to KPop entertainment agencies, comeback KPop performers, and managers of live stream platforms. (shrink)

Relational egalitarians claim that a situation is just only if everyone it involves relates to one another as equals. It implies that relational egalitarians believe the ideal of “living as equals” (for short) is desirable, and furthermore, necessary for justice. In this paper, I distinguish three accounts of the desirability of the ideal: the instrumental value account, the non‐instrumental value account, and the non‐consequentialist account. I argue that the former two accounts cannot provide satisfying reasons for being a relational egalitarian. (...) Instead, the ideal of “living as equals” ought to be understood as fundamentally a moral requirement in a non‐consequentialist sense. In addition, a pluralist (though fundamentally non‐consequentialist) approach is welcome. (shrink)

This book is characterized by its attention to the crisis communication in Ukraine from the discourse-analytical perspective, particularly focusing on the political situation in Ukraine and its com...

Previous studies suggested that culture have impact on students' mathematics achievement and subjective wellbeing, but few investigated the effects of culture on the balance between them. Drawing on Hofstede's cultural dimensions theory, this study investigated the effects of culture on balance between students' mathematics achievement and subjective wellbeing. Results showed the significant effects of cultural dimensions of long-term orientation vs. short-term orientation and indulgence vs. restraint. Students from countries of high long-term orientation and low indulgence culture were more likely to (...) get both high mathematics achievement and high SWB. Besides, wealth-related variables and gender were also found to influence the odds ratio of balance. The findings confirmed the effects of national culture on the balance between mathematics achievement and SWB. Based on the findings, this study discussed the effects of long-term orientation and restraint culture and Confucian heritage culture's potential benefit. The results indicate that mathematics educators should consider cultural differences in educational practice and stress the importance and meaning of mathematics learning. (shrink)

Aristotle and Xunzi on Shame, Moral Education and the Good Life is the first major work that takes two philosophers from the ancient Greek and early Chinese traditions to stimulate discussion of an interdisciplinary nature on the rich and complex topic of the emotions, in particular shame. It features sophisticated comparative analysis of the Greek and Chinese texts while bringing the ancient materials to bear on modern controversies such as the role of shame in moral education and social cohesion. Despite (...) fundamental differences in their social-historical and intellectual backgrounds, Aristotle and Xunzi bear striking similarities in several respects: their concept of humans as essentially members of communities, as having a unique set of characteristics that set them apart from other living things, and as beings in need of moral training to fulfil their potential and become integrated into a well-ordered society. The two philosophers' discourses on shame reveal important insights into their ideals of human nature, moral education and the good life. This book tackles directly the methodological problems that are relevant to anyone interested in cross-cultural comparisons and organises discussion of the ancient sources in such a way as to facilitate a thorough integration of perspectives from the cultural traditions concerned. This approach provides sufficient focus to allow for detailed textual analysis while giving scope for making constant connections to the broader comparative questions at issue. (shrink)

Third-party fairness maintenance could win some reputational benefits, and it includes two methods: punishment and compensation. We predicted that the third parties' preference between punishment and compensation are affected by whether they are free to choose between the two methods, and the affection could be interpreted through reputational benefits. The present study includes two sections. In Study 1, the participants acted as fourth parties who were asked to rate the reputations of the third parties who had chosen different response methods (...) to an unfair result of the dictator game. The results showed that there was no reputational difference between the two methods when third parties were not free to choose, but the reputation of compensation was better when third parties were free to choose. In Study 2, the participants acted as third parties. The participants were asked to choose a method to respond to an unfair result of the dictator game. There were two reputational contexts: secret and open. The results showed that when third parties were not free to choose, they had no preference between the two methods under the two reputational contexts, but when third parties were free to choose freely, they prefer punishment under the secret context but prefer compensation under the open context. This study systematically reveals a reputational interaction between fourth and third parties, and verifies the affection of reputational benefits on the third parties' preference between punishment and compensation. (shrink)

Emotional fluctuations are ubiquitous in everyday life, but precisely how they sculpt the temporal organisation of memories remains unclear. Here, we designed a novel task – the Emotion Boundary Task – wherein participants viewed sequences of negative and neutral images surrounded by a colour border. We manipulated perceptual context (border colour), emotional-picture valence, as well as the direction of emotional-valence shifts (i.e., shifts from neutral-to-negative and negative-to-neutral events) to create events with a shared perceptual and/or emotional context. We measured memory (...) for temporal order and temporal distances for images processed within and across events. Negative images processed within events were remembered as closer in time compared to neutral ones. In contrast, temporal distances were remembered as longer for images spanning neutral-to-negative shifts – suggesting temporal dilation in memory with the onset of a negative event following a previously-neutral state. The extent of negative-picture induced temporal dilation in memory correlated with dispositional negativity across individuals. Lastly, temporal order memory was enhanced for recently-presented negative (versus neutral) images. These findings suggest that emotional-state dynamics matters when considering emotion-temporal memory interactions: While persistent negative events may compress subjectively remembered time, dynamic shifts from neutral-to-negative events produce temporal dilation in memory, with implications for adaptive emotional functioning. (shrink)

Family health education is a must for every family, so that children can be taught how to protect their own health. However, in this era of artificial intelligence, many technical operations based on artificial intelligence are born, so the purpose of this study is to apply artificial intelligence technology to family health education. This paper proposes a fusion of artificial intelligence and IoT technologies. Based on the characteristics of artificial intelligence technology, it combines ZigBee technology and RFID technology in the (...) Internet of Things technology to design an artificial intelligence-based service system. Then it designs the theme of family health education by conducting a questionnaire on students’ family education and analyzing the results of the questionnaire. And it designs database and performance analysis experiments to improve the artificial intelligence-based family health education public service system designed in this paper. Finally, a comparative experiment between the family health education public service system based on artificial intelligence and the traditional health education method will be carried out. The experimental results show that the family health education public service system based on artificial intelligence has improved by 21.74% compared with the traditional family health education method; compared with the traditional family health education method, the health education effect of the family health education public service system based on artificial intelligence has increased by 13.89%. (shrink)

The participation of humanists, artists and social scientists has added much impetus to the study and story of the "anthropocene". Zhao Defa, the contemporary Chinese writer, is one of the pacesetters in this regard. His inspiration from the concept of the "anthropocene" transforms the body narrative in the novel The Anthropocene. This article argues that the changed triad of body narrative, or more specifically, the highly encoded bodily metaphors, the function of body in narrative and the relation between nature and (...) body, succeeds in modelling a body charged with ballooning desires in the "anthropocene", which constitutes the humanity's the existential basis and the very cause of the "anthropocene", and if not hurdled, will bring fatal catastrophe to this planet. (shrink)

En el centro de los debates sobre la desaparición y el resurgimiento del espacio público se encuentra el concepto de lo público, que a menudo se utiliza para definir las cualidades más deseables que desde el punto de vista normativo y prescriptivo debe poseer un espacio público. Este artículo, en lugar de proponer un ideal abstracto y normativo universalmente aplicable a lo público, aboga por su desnormalización, abordando este concepto como un estado del espacio que es público de una determinada (...) manera y en un contexto determinado. Para ilustrar las múltiples capas posibles de lo público, el artículo utiliza como estudio de caso la regeneración del espacio público de la ribera del río Huangpu en Shanghai. Examinando la transformación de esta ribera en las dos últimas décadas y centrados en el reciente proyecto de conexión del espacio público, el artículo muestra las diferentes formas en las que el diseño y el desarrollo del espacio público se entrelazan con el ideal de metrópolis orientada a las personas, propuesto como la clave de la pretensión ambiciosa de que Shanghái se convierta en una «excellent global city». A partir del análisis de la retórica y de la realidad del desarrollo del espacio público en la ribera en Shanghái orientado a las personas, este artículo muestra tres capas diferentes de lo público: lo público localizado, lo público procedimental y lo público simbólico, que se refieren no solo a la calidad material sino también a los procesos de distribución y construcción discursiva del espacio público. Este debate sobre las múltiples caras posibles de lo público servirá de punto de partida para seguir investigando cómo abordar lo público más allá del confinamiento de los límites espaciales como parte de la amplia y compleja dinámica de poder de las ciudades contemporáneas. (shrink)

Responsible risk management is central to banking ethics. With the 1999 publication of the Basel Committee's proposal, Basel II, for a New Capital Accord to replace the 1988 agreement, Basel I, an attempt has been made to address the problem of correlating banks' risk management with their capital requirements. The Basel II framework, finalised in June 2004, is designed to improve risk management by using models based on past performance to help set the amount of capital banks are required to (...) hold by regulators, with the purpose of improving the efficiency of capital allocation. The objectives of this study are to investigate how banks generally, but particularly those located in China, could improve their risk management systems and what the implications of these new regulations are for them. Three relevant propositions were formulated, namely, Basel II will improve risk management; Basel II will improve capital allocation efficiency; and compliance with advanced risk management systems is biased in favour of the large banks. Evidence was assembled with which to evaluate these three propositions by gathering relevant primary data by means of a representative survey of Chinese banking executives involved in risk management. The findings strongly support the first two of the above propositions and partly support the third proposition. (shrink)

本书从深层次上去把握中国古代尚清审美趣味的实质性意义及其审美价值,并从宏观上阐明了其产生与发展、演化的历史过程及其相应的社会基础与意识形态根源。.

This paper expands the definition of gray-marketing to include some ethically problematic marketing activities and techniques used in personal selling in China. Based on this, a conceptual model of gray-marketing for a particular type of selling in which both the sellers and the buyers exhibit problematic ethics in an exchange and the associated hypotheses are developed and tested. The findings show that, first, the respondents have different ethical evaluations of different marketing practices used in personal selling such as giving and (...) accepting gifts, buying and accepting meals, and offering and accepting kickbacks. Some of these practices may not be considered unethical. Second, in terms of ethical assessment, gray-marketing practiced by buying agents is more unacceptable than when practiced by sales agents. Third, a person's ethical evaluation of gray-marketing behavior, empathy for gray-marketing, and belief that gray-marketing has serious consequences, significantly affects his inclination to use gray-marketing. This paper concludes with a discussion of some possible applications of our research findings. (shrink)

Emotion recognition plays an important part in human-computer interaction. Currently, the main challenge in electroencephalogram -based emotion recognition is the non-stationarity of EEG signals, which causes performance of the trained model decreasing over time. In this paper, we propose a two-level domain adaptation neural network to construct a transfer model for EEG-based emotion recognition. Specifically, deep features from the topological graph, which preserve topological information from EEG signals, are extracted using a deep neural network. These features are then passed through (...) TDANN for two-level domain confusion. The first level uses the maximum mean discrepancy to reduce the distribution discrepancy of deep features between source domain and target domain, and the second uses the domain adversarial neural network to force the deep features closer to their corresponding class centers. We evaluated the domain-transfer performance of the model on both our self-built data set and the public data set SEED. In the cross-day transfer experiment, the ability to accurately discriminate joy from other emotions was high: sadness, anger, and fear on the self-built data set. The accuracy reached 74.93% on the SEED data set. In the cross-subject transfer experiment, the ability to accurately discriminate joy from other emotions was equally high: sadness, anger, and fear on the self-built data set. The average accuracy reached 87.9% on the SEED data set, which was higher than WGAN-DA. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed TDANN can effectively handle the domain transfer problem in EEG-based emotion recognition. (shrink)

全书选收辞条近700条,主要包括马克思主义哲学史上的基本理论、主要著作、有关人物、流派、事件等内容.

This study is aimed at investigating the relationship between perceived teacher support and learning engagement and exploring the mediation role played by technology acceptance and learning motivation. It adopted a structural equation modeling approach, with sampling 467 students from four middle schools in eastern China. The research findings showed that perceived teacher support is significantly associated with learning engagement. Learning motivation plays a mediating role in the relationship between perceived teacher support and learning engagement. There is the chain mediating effect (...) of technology acceptance and learning motivation on the relationship between perceived teacher support and learning engagement. All of these are of great importance for the teachers in the middle schools, as they help to increase students’ engagement with learning activities considering the background of the deep integration of information technology and education teaching. (shrink)

The prevalence of mobile phone addiction has increased rapidly in recent years, and it has had a certain negative impact on emotions and cognitive capacities. At the level of neural circuits, the continued increase in activity in the brain regions associated with addiction leads to neural adaptations and structural changes. At present, the spontaneous brain microstates that could be negatively influenced by MPA are unclear. In this study, the temporal characteristics of four resting-state electroencephalogram microstates related to mobile phone addiction (...) tendency were investigated using the Mobile Phone Addiction Tendency Scale. We attempted to analyze the correlation between MPAT and corresponding microstates and provide evidence to explain the brain and behavioral changes caused by MPA. The results showed that the total score of the MPATS was positively correlated with the duration of MS1, related to phonological processing and negatively correlated with the duration of MS2, related to visual or imagery processing, and MS4, related to the attentional network; the score of the withdrawal symptoms subscale was additionally associated with duration of MS3, related to the cingulo-opercular emotional network. Based on these results, we believe that MPAT may have some negative effects on attentional networks and sensory brain networks; moreover, withdrawal symptoms may induce some negative emotions. (shrink)

Frida Kahlo (1907–1954) was a Mexican artist who is remembered for her self-portraits, pain and passion, and bold, vibrant colors. This work aims to use her life story and her artistic production in a longitudinal study to examine with quantitative tools the effects of physical and emotional pain (rage) on artistic expression. Kahlo suffered from polio as a child, was involved in a bus accident as a teenager where she suffered multiple fractures of her spine and had 30 operations throughout (...) her lifetime. She also had a tempestuous relationship with her painter husband, Diego Rivera. Her physical and personal troubles however became the texture of her vivid visual vocabulary—usually expressed through the depiction of Mexican and indigenous culture or the female experience and form. We applied color analysis to a series of Frida's self-portraits and revealed a very strong association of physical pain and emotional rage with low wavelength colors (red and yellow), indicating that the expression of her ailments was, consciously or not, achieved by increasing the perceived luminance of the canvas. Further quantitative analysis that used the fractal dimension identified “The broken column” as the portrait with higher compositional complexity, which matches previous critical acclaim of this portrait as the climax of her art. These results confirm the ability of color analysis to extract emotional and cognitive features from artistic work. We suggest that these tools could be used as markers to support artistic and creative interventions in mental health. (shrink)

This article conducts a mixed-method content analysis of Chinese and American news media coverage of Google DeepMind’s Go playing computer program, AlphaGo. Drawing on humanistic approaches to artificial intelligence, combined with an empirically rigorous content analysis, it examines the differences and overlap in coverage by the Chinese and American press in their accounts of AlphaGo, and its historic match with Korea’s Lee Sedol in March, 2016. The event was not only followed intensely in China, but also made the front page (...) of The New York Times. This article finds that the Chinese press was more likely than the American press to frame AlphaGo as non-threatening, which the authors attribute to cultural differences and the two countries' different understandings of Go. In addition to quantitatively identifying similarities and differences in the framing of AlphaGo, this paper also investigates the underlying and evolving contestations over what constitutes the “human” and the “machine.” It concludes by discussing the implications of the study’s findings as well as outlining avenues for further research. (shrink)

In "On Variations of Classical Chinese Literary Theory for a Framework of Global Literary History" Peina Zhuang discusses texts of classical Chinese literary theory as a reservoir for philosophical reflections on literary art. The aesthetics of Chinese literature originate in Confucianism and Taoism and hence represent an important background for any discussion of ancient, modern, or contemporary Chinese literature and literary history. Zhuang analyzes texts of classical Chinese literary theory within such a framework of a literary history and (...) aims at furthering Chinese literature to become an integral part of world literatures. Further, Zhuang argues that "history" and "literary history" present a different picture of works on classical Chinese literary theory owing to the variation caused in representing their literary and aesthetic features. Zhuang also posits that the translation of Chinese literary texts to Western languages, while relevant and important, is not enough to advance Chinese literature from a peripheral status to a status of recognition hence the importance of scholarship with regard to literary history specifically. (shrink)

This book is characterized by its attention to the crisis communication in Ukraine from the discourse-analytical perspective, particularly focusing on the political situation in Ukraine and its com...

The fuzzy clustering algorithm has been widely used in the research area and production and life. However, the conventional fuzzy algorithms have a disadvantage of high computational complexity. This article proposes an improved fuzzy C-means algorithm based on K-means and principle of granularity. This algorithm is aiming at solving the problems of optimal number of clusters and sensitivity to the data initialization in the conventional FCM methods. The initialization stage of the K-medoid cluster, which is different from others, has a (...) strong representation and is capable of detecting data with different sizes. Meanwhile, through the combination of the granular computing and FCM, the optimal number of clusters is obtained by choosing accurate validity functions. Finally, the detailed clustering process of the proposed algorithm is presented, and its performance is validated by simulation tests. The test results show that the proposed improved FCM algorithm has enhanced clustering performance in the computational complexity, running time, cluster effectiveness compared with the existing FCM algorithms. (shrink)