# IoT Socioeconomicenvironmental Assessment Instrument: Validation Process Applying Delphi Method
## 3 Results
### Delphi Technique Application
#### 3.3.1 Expert Selection  
Considering that the principal author is a researcher with expertise in the field, she is familiar with individuals working in the area or in related fields. Consequently, she reached out to university colleagues via email and phone calls to extend invitations for participation. Information regarding managers and consultants was collected through professional colleagues, whereas data on relevant associations was gathered via an online search. The panel size was initially set between 6 and 11 members, as recommended by [PERSON] et al. [32]. The target groups included academics from Federal or State universities in Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ, UERJ, UFF) from the Industrial Engineering departments, consultants and managers specializing in circular economy, or the Brazilian associations concerning the Internet of Things (ABINC--Brazilian Association of the Internet of Things <[[https://abinc.org.br/](https://abinc.org.br/)]([https://abinc.org.br/](https://abinc.org.br/))>; IOTBRASIL--Brazilian IoT Forum <[[https://iotbrasil.org.br/index.php](https://iotbrasil.org.br/index.php)]([https://iotbrasil.org.br/index.php](https://iotbrasil.org.br/index.php))>). Finding individuals willing to participate proved to be difficult. Even when they agreed to join, their level of engagement in the process was lower than expected. As [PERSON] et al. [39] (p. 7) emphasized, \"Despite its strengths, the possibility of low response rates, multiple rounds of discussions and maintaining strong feedback remain major challenges for the Delphi method\". The final panel size comprised six experts: two consultants, two academics and two managers. Table 1 shows the experts involved in this study. [leftmargin=*] **Professional Title**: **Area of Expertise**: **Years of Experience**: **Associate Professor--Head of the Department of Industrial Engineering; Production Engineering and Environmental Management--Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. Associate Professor--Head of the Department of Production Engineering of Faculty of Technology--FAT/State University of Rio de Janeiro; postdoctoral studies in circular economy and regional economic metabolism at the University of Aveiro. \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{l l l} \hline \hline
**Professional Title** & **Area of Expertise** & **Years of Experience** \\ \hline \multirow{3}{*}{Academic} & Associate Professor—Head of the Department of Industrial Engineering; Production Engineering and Environmental Management—Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. & 15 \\  & Associate Professor—Head of the Department of Production Engineering of Faculty of Technology—FAT/State University of Rio de Janeiro; postdoctoral studies in circular economy and regional economic metabolism at the University of Aveiro. & 11 \\ \cline{1-1}  & & \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table} 
Table 1: Experts’ profile 1. Statistical analyses were applied, including content validity of individual items (I-CVI) and the average proportion of items (S-CVI/Ave). The content validity of individual items (I-CVI) [29] was applied, calculating an item level from six experts to quantify the relevancy of each statement by the respondents' agreement. Concerning the total items, the S-CVI/Ave corresponded with the average proportion of statements. The literature [29] recommends a scale to reach a strong conceptualizations of constructs and good statements for content validity as \"it would be composed of items with I-CVIs that meet [PERSON]'s, 1986 criteria (I-CVI 1/4 1.00 with 3 to 5 experts and a minimum I-CVI of 0.78 for 6 to 10 experts) and it would have an S-CVI/Ave of 0.90 or higher.\" [29] (p. 496).