MULTI-STAGE TECHNIQUE 'PAKS' FOR MULTIPLE CRITERIA DECISION AIDING

This paper describes a new multi-stage technique PAKS (the abbreviation of Russian words: Consequent Aggregation of Classified Situations) for sorting multi-attribute objects by a group. Based on decision maker preferences, this technique provides a hierarchical aggregation of a large number of initial attributes into a smaller number of criteria, thus reducing the dimension of the attribute space progressively, using various tools of verbal decision analysis. The consequent aggregation of attributes allows generating manifold lists of composite criteria with numerical and/or verbal scales, finding and analyzing the most preferable solution of a decision problem. The technique was applied to evaluate efficiency of R&D projects, which were assessed by several experts on many qualitative criteria and subsidized by the Russian Foundation for Basic Research.