Comparative Analysis of Multiattribute Decision Aids with Ordinal Preferences on Attribute Weights

Abstract

In a situation that ordinal preferences on multiattribute weights are captured, we present two solution approaches: an exact approach and an approximate method. The former, an exact solution approach via interaction with a decision-maker, pursues the progressive reduction of a set of non-dominated alternatives by narrowing down the feasible attribute weights region. Subsequent interactive questions and responses, however, sometimes may not guarantee the best alternative or a complete rank order of a set of alternatives that the decision-maker desires to have. Approximate solution approaches, on the other hand, can be divided into three categories including surrogate weights methods, dominance value-based decision rules, and three classical decision rules. Their efficacies are evaluated in terms of choice accuracy via a simulation analysis. The simulation results indicate that a proposed hybrid approach, intended to combine an exact solution approach through interaction and a dominance value-based approach, is recommendable for aiding a decision making in a case that a final choice is seldom made at single step under attribute weights that are imprecisely specified beyond ordinal descriptions.