Goal programming and cognitive biases in decision-making

The study of cognitive biases in decision-making has largely arisen within the context of the subjective expected utility school of decision analysis. Many of the behavioural patterns that have been discovered do seem to be relevant to broader areas of multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA). In this...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inThe Journal of the Operational Research Society Vol. 56; no. 10; pp. 1166 - 1175
Main Author Stewart, T J
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Basingstoke Taylor & Francis 01.10.2005
Palgrave Macmillan Press
Palgrave
Taylor & Francis Ltd
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Summary:The study of cognitive biases in decision-making has largely arisen within the context of the subjective expected utility school of decision analysis. Many of the behavioural patterns that have been discovered do seem to be relevant to broader areas of multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA). In this paper, we look specifically at the judgemental inputs required in implementing goal programming (GP) models. The potential relevance of some of the known cognitive biases in this context are identified, and their impact studied by means of simulation experiments. It is found, inter alia, that biases due to anchoring and adjustment and to avoidance of sure loss can lead to substantial degradation in the performance of GP algorithms. Suggestions for practice and recommendations for follow-up research are derived from the simulation results.
ISSN:0160-5682
1476-9360
DOI:10.1057/palgrave.jors.2601948