An Argumentation-Based Approach for Decision Making

Abstract

The formalisation of design decisions serves two purposes: To support the decision maker in choosing which decision to take (decision analysis), and to document the reasons behind decisions for future reference (decision documentation). Approaches which solve the latter task involve a semi-formal pattern of documenting the reasons for and against each of the options, but they generally do not allow an automation of the decision making process. Approaches which solve the former task use a mathematical model of the problem, in which each option is evaluated numerically with respect to some relevant criteria, but they do not support documentation. We investigate the use of argumentation to both analyse and document decisions, solving both tasks with the same method. Additionally, the system we present is able to generate decisions for analysis, instead of relying on a predefined input of options. We collaborated with an aerospace manufacturer to identify common problems in the industry and to create realistic examples from the engineering domain. We show that our system subsumes a certain class of multi criteria decision making problems and that it improves upon previous argumentation-based decision making systems by adding the capability to generate decisions and by clearly defining the semantics used to choose accepted arguments.