Principles For Aiding Complex Military Decision Making

Paper presented to the Second International Command and Control Research and Technology Symposium, Monterey, Ca.The Tactical Decision Making Under Stress (TADMUS) program is being conducted to apply recent developments in decision theory and human-system interaction technology to the design of a decision support system for enhancing tactical decision making under the highly complex conditions involved in anti-air warfare scenarios in littoral environments. Our goal is to present decision support information in a format that minimizes any mismatches between the cognitive characteristics of the human decision maker and the design and response characteristics of the decision support system. Decision makers are presented with decision support tools which parallel the cognitive strategies they already employ, thus reducing the number of decision making errors. Hence, prototype display development has been based on decision making models postulated by naturalistic decision-making theory. Incorporating current human-system interaction design principles is expected to reduce cognitive processing demands and thereby mitigate decision errors caused by cognitive overload, which have been documented through research and experimentation. Topics include a discussion of: (1) the theoretical background for the TADMUS program; (2) a description of the cognitive tasks performed; (3) the decision support and human- system interaction design principles incorporated to reduce the cognitive processing load on the decision maker; and (4) a brief description of the types of errors made by decision makers and interpretations of the cause of these errors based on the cognitive psychology literature.Funding for the research cited in this paper was received from the Cognitive and Neural Science and Technology Division of the Office of Naval Research

How Systems Analysts Can Provide More Effective Assistance to the Policy Maker

Policy makers do not benefit from advances in (a) systems analysis or (b) judgement and decision theory because neither of these disciplines recognize the incompleteness of its methodology. A complete methodology requires a synthesis of the two. This RM explains why such a synthesis is necessary, describes how it can be achieved, and provides a worked-out example of its application to the problem of changing sources of energy production in the US. The example also illustrates that the linkage of systems analysis and judgement theory provides information that neither discipline can provide separately. Finally, the RM shows that such information is policy relevant and that it provides more effective assistance to the policy maker than does either approach used separately

Free will, temptation, and self-control: We must believe in free will, we have no choice (Isaac B. Singer).

Baumeister, Sparks, Stillman, and Vohs (2007) sketch a theory of free will as the humanability to exert self-control. Self-control can produce goal-directed behavior, which free will conceptualized as random behavior cannot. We question whether consumer psychology can shed light on the ontological question of whether free will exists. We suggest that it is more fruitful for consumer psychology to examine consumers' belief in freewill. Specifically, we propose that this belief arises from consumers' phenomenological experience of exercising self-control in the face of moral or intertemporal conflicts of will. Based on extant literature in philosophy, psychology, and economics, we offer both a narrower conceptualization of the nature of self-control problems and a more general conceptualization of self-control strategies, involving not only will power but also precommitment. We conclude with a discussion of the consequences of consumers' belief in free will.

Salience Theory of Choice Under Risk

We present a theory of choice among lotteries in which the decision maker's attention is drawn to (precisely defined) salient payoffs. This leads the decision maker to a context-dependent representation of lotteries in which true probabilities are replaced by decision weights distorted in favor of salient payoffs. By specifying decision weights as a function of payoffs, our model provides a novel and unified account of many empirical phenomena, including frequent risk-seeking behavior, invariance failures such as the Allais paradox, and preference reversals. It also yields new predictions, including some that distinguish it from prospect theory, which we test.Economic

Two discourses: Researchers and policy-making in higher education

The theme of this article focuses on how policy discourse and research discourse meet in contract research in higher education. The interplay of these discourses has consequences for researchers who have to balance conflicting demands, which we view as links between research and policy cycles. Two evaluation studies on the introduction and effects of new policy instruments are discussed, focusing on the interaction between policy needs, and research design. The examples are taken from policies in the development towards increasing self-regulation in higher education, of which Finland and the Netherlands are interesting examples in the European context

DATABASE APPROACH FOR MULTIPLE-CRITERIA DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEMS

This paper focuses on data management aspects of computerized decision support systems which use interactive multiple criteria decision methods. In this context, we point out the technical requirements for such systems and the importance of the data management tool to MCDSS. After a discussion of candidate data models (i.e. relational, hierarchical, and network), we examine the criteria to use in choosing the data model for MCDSS. In the last part of this paper, we review some database management services which support data definition, data manipulation, and data integrity within the multiple-criteria decision making framework. These services guide us when designing the appropriate architecture for the MCDSSâs data component.Information Systems Working Papers Serie

Either, Or. Exploration of an Emerging Decision Theory.

A novel decision theory is emerging out of sparse findings in economics, mathematics and, most importantly, psychology and computational cognitive science. It rejects a fundamental assumption of the theory of rational decision-making, namely, that uncertain belief rests on independent assessment of utility and probability, and includes envisioning possibilities within its scope. Several researchers working with these premises, independently of one another, arrived at the conclusion that decision is made by highlighting the positive features of the alternative that will be chosen while opposing it to a loosing alternative, whose unpleasant aspects have been stressed. This article frames together contributions from different disciplines, often unknown to one another, with the hope of improving the coordination of research efforts. Furthermore, it discusses the status of the novel theory with respect to our current idea of rationality.Rationality; Shackle; Shafer; Search for Dominant Structure; Differentiation -- Consolidation; Constraint Satisfaction Networks; Construction of Narratives

Toward a mathematical formalism of performance, task difficulty, and activation

The rudiments of a mathematical formalism for handling operational, physiological, and psychological concepts are developed for use by the man-machine system design engineer. The formalism provides a framework for developing a structured, systematic approach to the interface design problem, using existing mathematical tools, and simplifying the problem of telling a machine how to measure and use performance