618-262 Decision-Making

Credit Points:

When taken from Mathematics, Faculty of Science:

12.5

When taken from Mathematics and Statistics, Faculty of Education:

12.0

Coordinator:

Prerequisite/s:

Timetable:

Contact:

Objectives:

On completion of this subject, students should:

Comprehend:

• the essential features of decision-making situations encountered in operations research investigations;

• the difference between these situations and ordinary optimisation problems;

• what kind of practical problems have these features;

• a number of basic mathematical approaches to such situations;

• techniques used to solve decision-making situations represented by these approaches; the theoretical foundations of these techniques;

• practical issues involved in the implementation of these techniques.

Have developed:

• basic skills required to construct formal mathematical models for practical decision-making situations;

• skills needed to solve a number of two-person games, including zero-sum and non-zero-sum games, cooperative and non-cooperative games, with the aid of linear and nonlinear programming techniques;

• skills to make use of the relationship between primal and dual problems and their respective optimal solutions in the context of zero-sum two-person games;

• skills in using linear programming and dynamic programming techniques in the solution of a number of multi-objective optimisation problems;

• skills to evaluate rules for decision-making problems under strict uncertainty.

Appreciate:

• the complexity of decision-making situations encountered in operations research investigations;

• the subjective nature of what constitutes a solution to a problem of this type;

• the extent and limitations of a number of operations research techniques used to solve such problems;

• the important role that linear algebra and calculus play in the development of these techniques;

• the important role that computers play in solving problems of this type.

Content:

Decision analysis: a selection of topics in decision analysis, including single-stage and multi-stage decision models, in particular those using linear programmes; zero-sum games; preference relations and optimisation; multi-criteria decision making; decision trees. Use of computer packages on the Macintosh.

Assessment: