Continuous Ordered Weighted Distance Measure and Its Application to Multiple Attribute Group Decision Making

Abstract

We develop a new distance measure called the continuous ordered weighted distance (COWD) measure by using the continuous ordered weighted averaging (COWA) operator in the interval distance. We study some properties and different families of the COWD measure. We further generalize the COWD measure. The prominent characteristics of the COWD measure are that it is not only a generalization of some widely used distance measures and the continuous generalized OWA operator, but also it can deal with interval deviations in aggregation on interval arguments by using a controlled parameter. The desirable characteristics make the COWD measure be suitable to wide range situations, such as decision making, engineering and economics. In the end, we develop the new approach to group decision making in investment selection.