Outranking method for intuitionistic 2-tuple fuzzy linguistic information model in group decision making

Abstract

This paper attempts to develop an outranking method based on intuitionistic 2-tuple fuzzy linguistic information and apply it to multi-criteria group decision-making problems. The theory of intuitionistic 2-tuple fuzzy linguistic elements (I2FLEs) is useful for modeling impressions and quantifying the ambiguous nature of subjective judgments in a convenient manner. The family of ELECTRE methods is well known and widely used outranking method, but it has not been investigated within the intuitionistic 2-tuple fuzzy linguistic environment. ELECTRE uses the concept of an outranking relationship. Therefore, the directional Hausdorff distance, which uses I2FLEs, is proposed and the outranking relations are subsequently defined using this distance. Furthermore, using the proposed score and accuracy functions of I2FLEs, this paper also develops an outranking method based on intuitionistic fuzzy support function, intuitionistic fuzzy risk function, intuitionistic fuzzy credibility function, and the net outranking flow index similar to the PROMETHEE method. An illustrative example is given to demonstrate the practicality and effectiveness of the developed approaches. Finally, a comparative discussion of two decision-making methods is conducted to demonstrate the advantages of the proposed method over the other.