Preferences and Domination

CP-nets are a succinct formalism for specifying preferences over a multi-featured domain. A CP-net consists of a directed graph, with nodes representing the features of the domain, and edges indicating conditional preferences. An instance in the domain is an assignment of values to the features. An instance alpha is preferred to an instance beta if there are a sequence of "improving flips" from alpha to beta, where an improving flip changes the value of one feature to a more-preferred value, based on the values of the parents of that feature. We say alpha dominates beta if such a sequence exists. We show that recognizing dominance is PSPACE hard for cyclic CP-nets

Lessons Learned from Development of a Software Tool to Support Academic Advising

We detail some lessons learned while designing and testing a decision-theoretic advising support tool for undergraduates at a large state university. Between 2009 and 2011 we conducted two surveys of over 500 students in multiple majors and colleges. These surveys asked students detailed questions about their preferences concerning course selection, advising, and career paths. We present data from this study which may be helpful for faculty and staff who advise undergraduate students. We find that advising support software tools can augment the student-advisor relationship, particularly in terms of course planning, but cannot and should not replace in-person advising.Comment: 5 Figures, revised version including more figures and cross-referencin