Basic concepts for a theory of evaluation: Hierarchical aggregation via autodistributive connectives in fuzzy set theory

Abstract The ‘aggregative operator’ introduced by Combi (1982) in his analysis of ‘basic concepts for a theory of evaluation’ in this journal is based on the axioms of associativity, continuity, and monotonicity. In this paper, an alternative approach is given where associativity is replaced by another axiom, viz. autodistributivity, implying a kind of hierarchical aggregation instead of the former horizontal one. The new set of properties yields a general class of operators for connecting fuzzy sets which are formally similar to the aggregative operators, but are purely compensative (in a strong sense). Moreover, this modified approach generalizes a recent approach based on generalized means as compensative connectives. It appears to be similar to expected utility approaches in decision making under uncertainty, and seems to be a very promising tool to handle representation problems as they grow from other fields of human decision making, e.g. of multicriteria analysis and of welfare theory.