| Abstract: | This paper develops and expands the use of multidimension scaling techniques (MDSCAL) as applied in the two separate fields of psychological testing and archaeology to the problem of multiple criteria decision making. Other work by the author published elsewhere shows that it is feasible to use MDSCAL for drawing maps of separate policies using very weak input information from which deductions as to most preferred and least preferred policies may be drawn. An application of this method is made, to show its use and a comparison made with the utility approach. The final, and main, part of the paper examines the robustness of the method for both deterministic and probabilistic input criteria. In this examination it is seen that the mapping method performs very well in picking up extremes of preference even under severe tests of robustness. |
