A prospect theory-based method for fusing the individual preference-approval structures in group decision making

Preference-approval structure is a typical preference structure that can not only reflect decision makers' preference orderings for alternatives but also distinguish the satisfied alternatives from the dissatisfied alternatives. The aim of this paper is to propose a method to fuse the individual preference-approval structures in group decision making (GDM), in which the weight of decision makers can be represented as the exact number (i.e., exact weight), the interval number (i.e., interval weight) and the rankings (i.e., ranking weight). In the method, based on prospect theory, the prospect values of all the alternatives associated with each decision maker are calculated. In addition, the expected values of the weights of decision makers are calculated. Then, the relative-position indicators of the alternatives are determined. In addition, two algorithms are proposed to determine the reading sequences of the alternatives. Based on the reading sequences, an algorithm is proposed to construct the fused preference-approval structure. Next, some desirable properties of the proposed method are discussed. Finally, an example is given to illustrate the use of the proposed method, and the versatility, consistency, efficiency and computational complexity of the proposed method are discussed.