Understanding the Effect of Assignment of Importance Scores of Evaluation Criteria Randomly in the Application of DOE-TOPSIS in Decision Making

Abstract

In conventional applications of hybrid DoE-TOPSIS technique in decision making problems, full factorial design layouts are generally used because of their ability to measure the effects of all possible combinations for evaluation factors. In a typical application, for a design layout, a number of replications are generated by assigning different sets of relative importance scores for evaluation factors. A TOPSIS score is then obtained for each experiment and replication pair. Regression analysis is finally applied to obtain a relationship with inputs (values of evaluation factors) and outputs (alternatives' TOPSIS meta-model scores). The key in conventional application of hybrid DoE-TOPSIS technique is generation of relative importance scores. Each set of scores can be assigned by a decision maker or generated randomly. This paper aims to determine whether using either of the two methods in determination of relative importance scores makes any difference in the ranking orders of alternatives.