An Experimental Evaluation of Articulation of Preferences in Multiple Criterion Decision‐Making (MCDM) Methods

This paper describes the results of a study done to determine how well multiple criterion decision-making methods perform in helping a decision maker arrive at a preferred solution to a multicriterion problem with conflicting objectives. The study used a factorial experiment and doctoral students as subjects. Two competing methods for solving multicriterion problems were compared along with the influence of problem complexity. The methods differed in the way preferences were articulated by decision makers. The results showed that there was no difference between the methods for several performance measures, disaffirming some prior expectations. From an actual use point of view, the study suggests that methodological improvements to existing techniques must be matched by efforts to improve information presentation and interpretation to facilitate preference judgments.