Interval intuitionistic fuzzy multi-attribute group decision-making based on herd behavior and empathy relationship

In real-world group decision-making, decision makers often exhibit herd behavior due to incomplete information or the risk of social exclusion, and at the same time perceive the emotions of others through the affective empathy effect and incorporate their perspectives into their decisions. To expand the research scope and application field of group decision-making, a multi-attribute group decision-making method was proposed, which revealed the influence law of herd behavior and empathy relationship on group decision-making. A sequential decision analysis framework was constructed to effectively express the mechanism by which the decision maker's herd behavior influenced the group decision. Subsequently, an empathy network was introduced to define information on three aspects of decision maker's empathic relationship, evocative power and knowledge competence, which in turn explored the effect of these factors in the decision-making process. The herd relationship in the assessment phase combined empathy relationship, evocative power and knowledge competence; the decision-maker weights in the assembly phase were influenced by evocative power, while the point-in-time weights were determined by knowledge competence; in the consensus phase, empathy relationship was utilized to make suggestions for opinion adjustments. Finally, an example study illustrated that the proposed method was able to achieve reliable and stable results and was more efficient in reaching group consensus compared to traditional group decision-making methods. © 2024 CIMS. All rights reserved.