Belmont CA: Duxbury Press (1996),
Many instructors will want to supplement Making Hard Decisions with their own material. In fact, topics that I cover in my own courses are not included here. But, in the process of writing the book and obtaining comments from colleagues, it has become apparent that decision-making courses take on many different forms. Some instructors prefer to emphasize behavioral aspects, while others prefer analytical tools. Other dimensions have to do with competition, negotiation, and group decision making. Making Hard Decisions does not aim to cover everything for everyone. Instead, I have tried to cover the central concepts and tools of modern decision analysis with adequate references (and occasionally cases or problems) so that instructors can introduce their own special material where appropriate. For example, in Chapters 8 and 14 we discuss judgmental aspects of probability assessment and decision making, and an instructor can introduce more behavioral material at these points. Likewise, Chapter 15 delves into the additive utility function for decision making. Some instructors may wish to present goal programming or the analytic hierarchy process here.
In restructuring the book to incoporate value-focused thinking, it became clear that my colleagues were of several minds as to the best way to organize and present this topic. Some preferred to have all of the multiple-objective material put in the same place (Chapters 15 and 16), whereas others preferred to integrate the material throughout the text. Ultimately (after using value-focused thinking to help me decide!), I chose the latter, especially stressing the role of values in structuring decision models. In particular, students must read about structuring values at the beginning of Chapter 3 before going on to structuring influence diagrams or decision trees. The reason is simply that it makes sense to understand what one wants before trying to structure the decision. From my own teaching experience, introducing the notion of objectives early works well for students. In Gordon Hazen's words, "Once I ask the students about their objectives in a particular problem, I can't get them to shut up!"
At the same time, I attempted to organize the remaining material in Chapters 3 and 4 so that the instructor who wants to avoid the more technical aspects of value-focused thinking may do so. For example, material on creating attribute scales is left until the end of Chapter 3, and a multiobjective example is in its own section in Chapter 4. A reader can readily skip these sections and return to them later if the instructor wishes to cover all of the multiobjective material together at once.
Use the buttons below to access sections of the hyper-preface.
Introduction | New in the Second Edition | Guidelines for Students
Computers and Decision Analysis | A Word to Instructors
Keeping Up with Changes | Acknowledgements
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