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This study proposes a novel integrated Complex Proportional Assessment (COPRAS) approach by using stochastic decision process named as Stochastic COPRAS (COPRAS-S) to increase the evaluation performance of COPRAS. In COPRAS-S, criteria importance weights and the performance values of alternatives are determined by generating random numbers from uniform distribution in a range of minimum and maximum values of a limited number of decision-maker evaluations. Thus, the numbers of experts are increased and decision-making process is performed in an effective way because different opinions are incorporated. In addition, randomness feature brought with vagueness in decision is modeled in this process. A special normalization approach based on standard deviation is also implemented in COPRAS-S. In this way, cost and benefit type criteria are evaluated in a different way. This proposed stochastic structure for COPRAS is a practical and powerful tool that strengthens the decision.

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Purpose This study aims to determine the mall criteria that are the most crucial for the youth market by determining the winning brand in comparison to other offerings to understand what is required to gain a competitive advantage and to differentiate a mall from its rivals. Design/methodology/approach This study chose the Stochastic Multicriteria Acceptability Analysis-2 method to evaluate the mall preferences of young people. By using this method, the various criteria were evaluated for more than one alternative to find the best solution. JSMA program was used to analyze the data. The survey was administered using the mall intercept method to reduce sample bias. Findings The study identifies that the criteria that have the highest impact on the mall preferences of young people are the mall campaigns for loyal customers; the traffic in the mall locality and the mall’s parking facilities; the mall’s facilities for disabled people; the quality of the mall locality; and the quality of the people visiting the mall. The study reveals that a mall’s physical features, its facilities and the criteria related to employees have a very low impact on the mall choices of young people. The study further finds that the youth market has very low satisfaction levels for all of the identified criteria. This study reveals that this macro accessibility criterion is less relevant for the youth market than for the general population. Originality/value Despite the importance of this market, there is insufficient research on the shopping behavior of young people. They have a considerable impact on the purchasing decisions of their families, significant disposable income and constitute the future market for the sector. This study uniquely enables the sequential ordering of customers’ decision-making criteria and determines the effectiveness or impact of these criteria in the mall sector.

The user‐oriented design is the most important competition issue in today's market. In recent years, user‐oriented design (i.e., usability) has become expected, particularly in electronic devices. Usability considers high user satisfaction in conjunction with user performance. Usability of electronic products is essential for high customer satisfaction as well as product life cycles in companies. Therefore, MP3 players were selected among the electronic products. Designing usable MP3 players is extremely important for users who have close interaction with them. In this study, MP3 players of different types and sizes were selected and their usability evaluated. The usability criteria used in the MP3 players' evaluation were divided into two major categories: performance and emotional expectations. The alternatives were ranked with fuzzy multi‐criteria decision‐making methods, namely, Fuzzy TOPSIS (FTOPSIS), Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (FAHP), and Fuzzy Axiomatic Design Theory (FADT), and the results were compared. Although the same decision matrices and data obtained from semantic differential experiment were used for all fuzzy multi‐criteria decision‐making methods, it is shown that different rankings were obtained. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

In this article, a method is developed to transform the chance-constrained programming problem into a deterministic problem. We have considered a chance-constrained programming problem under the assumption that the random variables a ij are independent with Gamma distributions. This new method uses estimation of the distance between distribution of sum of these independent random variables having Gamma distribution and normal distribution, probabilistic constraint obtained via Essen inequality has been made deterministic using the approach suggested by Polya. The model studied on in practice stage has been solved under the assumption of both Gamma and normal distributions and the obtained results have been compared.