Cognitive Style and the Expectations Towards the Preference Representation in Decision Support Systems

Abstract

The goal of this paper is to investigate how the cognitive style is related to the expectations towards the support mechanisms offered in the decision support system while analyzing the multiple criteria decision making problem. We analyze the decision makers’ expectations regarding the forms of representing the results by the system (e.g. rankings vs. ratings), as well as the different ways in which they could declare their preferences (e.g. using numbers, words or pictograms). The relationship between the cognitive style determined by the Rational-Experiential Inventory and the decision makers declarations are examined using the correspondence and cluster analysis and fraction tests. The results to some extent confirm the postulates of the behavioral theory of decision making that the rational decision makers prefer the preference mechanisms that are more based on the numerical categories, oppositely to the experiential ones. Unfortunately, there are no clear patterns of preferences for versatile or indifferent decision makers. These results, however, do not so evidently correlate with the final recommendations of decision aiding methods.