Article ID: | iaor20091314 |
Country: | United Kingdom |
Volume: | 59 |
Issue: | 3 |
Start Page Number: | 407 |
End Page Number: | 415 |
Publication Date: | Mar 2008 |
Journal: | Journal of the Operational Research Society |
Authors: | Leskinen P. |
Keywords: | statistics: inference, measurement |
The ratio scale measurement of utilities in multi-criteria decision analysis has been criticised due to theoretical and practical interpretation of the required assessments. Compared to the ratio scale models, for example, the ‘0–1-scale’ models based on interval scale have been more generally accepted. On the other hand, under some conditions it has been shown that the results of multi-criteria decision support based on ratio scale comparisons are actually independent of the numerical magnitude of the ratio scale assessments. This paper reviews and interprets these results and proposes new solutions for the remaining problems, for which the numerical magnitude of the ratio scale utilities is required.