Assessment of Multiattributed Measurable Value and Utility Functions via Mathematical Programming*

A major restriction on the use of decision analysis in practice is the frequent difficulty of determining a decision maker's multiattribute utility function. The assessment process can be complex and tedious and generally involves: (1) identifying relevant independence conditions, (2) assessing conditional utility functions, (3) assessing scaling constants, and (4) checking for consistency. Some of the assessment and modeling complexities encountered include an assessor's inability to respond in a quantitatively meaningful and consistent way to hypothetical gambles and an analyst's problem in selecting an appropriate functional form that accurately characterizes the conditional utility assessments. A simplified procedure that mitigates these difficulties is proposed. This procedure facilitates the determination of scaling constants by obtaining (via mathematical programming) a multiattributed measurable value function which is converted to a multiattributed utility function. The methodology can be developed advantageously to produce an interactive software package for use as an assessment aid.