Affine construction methodology of aggregation functions

Abstract Aggregation functions have attracted much attention in recent times because of its potential use in many areas such us data fusion and decision making. In practice, most of the aggregation functions that scientists use in their studies are constructed from very simple (usually affine or polynomial) functions. However, these are distinct in nature. In this paper, we develop a systematic study of these two classes of functions from a common point of view. To do this, we introduce the class of affine aggregation functions, which cover both the aforementioned families and most of examples of aggregation functions that are used in practice, including, by its great applicability, the symmetric case. Our study allows us to characterize when a function constructed from affine or polynomial functions is, in fact, a new aggregation function. We also study when sums or products of this kind of functions are again an aggregation function.