Best-worst Research Articles

The Geometry of Dynamic Time-Dependent Best–Worst Choice Pairs

There has been increasing interest in best–worst discrete choice experiments (BWDCEs) in health economics, transportation research, and other fields over the last few years. BWDCEs have distinct advantages compared to other measurement approaches in discrete choice experiments (DCEs). A systematic study of best–worst (BW) choice pairs can be traced back to the 1990s. Recently, new ideas have been introduced to the subject. Calculating utility helps measure the attractiveness of BW choices. The goal of this paper is twofold. First, we extend the idea of the BW choice pair to include dynamic, time-dependent transition probability and capture utility at each time and for each choice pair. Second, we used the geometry of BW choice pairs to capture the correlations among them and to characterize and clarify the BW choice pairs in the network, where properties can be derived within each class. This paper discusses BWDCEs, the probability transition matrix of choices over time, and the utility function. The proposed network classification for BW choice pairs is laid out. A detailed simulated example is presented, and the results are compared with the classical K-means classification.

Treatment Outcome Priorities of Older Adults with Newly Diagnosed Blood Cancers Elicited with Best-Worst Scaling

Background: A clear understanding of patients' preferred treatment outcomes is necessary to guide treatment decision-making. In this study, we sought to quantify the treatment outcome priorities of older adults (≥ 60 years old) newly diagnosed with hematologic malignancies and to describe individual patient's willingness to tolerate specific treatment-related benefit-risk tradeoffs. Methods: We developed a values elicitation measure using best-worst (BW) scaling and direct elicitation through a community-centered approach engaging diverse stakeholders. The measure includes 7 treatment priorities: Living longer, Maintaining day-to-day activities, Avoiding becoming more dependent on others, Avoiding hospitalizations/Increasing time at home, Avoiding long-term side effects, Avoiding short-term side effects, and Avoiding high financial costs. Patients complete repeated choice tasks choosing the most and least important treatment priority among repeated subsets using a balanced-incomplete block design. Direct elicitation was used to determine specific benefit-risk tradeoff preferences. Recruitment occurred at a public safety-net hospital following pathologic diagnosis. Patients completed the measure prior to the initial treatment decision and longitudinally each month. Data from the BW scaling measure were analyzed using the count method (best minus worst) and standardized. Results: In total, 48 patients consented (48% lymphoma, 40% leukemia/myelodysplastic syndrome, 12% other). Mean age was 74 years (range 60 - 95); 59% were male; 96% were white; 67% had a bachelor's degree or higher. Fifty-two percent (n=25) fully completed the BWS instrument at least once. The ranked importance of priorities for the entire cohort was 1) Maintaining day-to-day activities (standardized best minus worst, 23.8), 2) Living longer (12.4), 3) Avoiding becoming more dependent on others (7.9), 4) Avoiding hospitalizations/Increasing time at home (2.2), 5) Avoiding long-term side effects (-5.2), 6) Avoiding short-term side effects (-19.5), and 7) Avoiding high financial costs (-21.5). The most important outcomes (including ties) for individual patients were Maintaining day-to-day activities (40% of patients), Living longer (40%), and Avoiding becoming dependent on others (20%), while the least important outcomes were Avoiding high financial costs (52%), Avoiding short term side-effects (32%), and Living longer (20%). Thirteen (52%) patients completed subsequent BWS surveys; 69% changed their most important outcome at least once. Direct elicitation demonstrated that patients were willing to accept additional hospital stays of 1 week (88%), 1 month (58%), and 3 months (25%) in exchange for an additional 6 months of life. Only 25% of patients indicated willingness to require a full-time caregiver in exchange for an additional 2 years of life, whereas patients were more willing to accept a part-time caregiver in exchange for an additional 1 month (38%) or 6 months (79%) of life. Some patients were unwilling to accept an additional 6 months of life if it meant requiring assistance dressing (33%) or bathing (54%). In exchange for an additional 6 months of life, patients were willing to spend $250 (83%), $500 (58%), or $1000 (42%) per month. Conclusions: Older adults with newly diagnosed blood cancers differed when prioritizing treatment outcomes. Maintaining function was highly valued and was frequently more important than prolonging survival. Some patients felt prolonging survival was least important. Many patients changed their treatment priorities over time. These results highlight the need to elicit treatment outcome priorities at the time of each significant treatment decision for older adults. Further, they suggest that endpoints other than overall survival should be considered for clinical trials in this population as prolonging survival may not be prioritized by most patients. This study also demonstrated that a combination of BW scaling and direct elicitation was able to quantify patients' treatment outcome priorities and benefit-risk tradeoff preferences, highlighting the potential for the development of similar values elicitation measures to be used to inform specific treatment decisions in various clinical contexts.

An Approach to Developing the Multicriteria Optimal Forest Management Plan: The “Fruska Gora” National Park Case Study

This paper proposes a decision-making framework that integrates Decision-Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL), Best-Worst (BW), and Ordered Weighted Averaging (OWA) methods in a forestry management problem. Namely, the application of the proposed framework has been shown in the case study area of the National Park “Fruska Gora” in Serbia. The decision-making problem included five criteria (biodiversity protection, wilderness protection, promotion of tourism, promotion of education function, and sustainable use of natural resources) and four alternatives—management plans (“business as usual”, “eco-tourism”, “protection of natural ecosystems” and “use of natural resources”). The results were focused on proclaiming a winning alternative in a multi-criteria context and have been tested for the different risk attitudes: risk-prone, risk-neutral, and risk-averse. For the risk-prone scenario, the winning alternative was “protection of natural ecosystems”, while the risk-neutral and risk-averse scenarios recognized “eco-tourism” as the winning alternative. The same procedure can be repeated for many other forest management tasks that require multiple criteria setting and risk attitude analysis.

Food sustainability perception at universities: Education and demographic features effects

The 2030 Agenda of the United Nations merged in 17 goals the strong need to change the pattern of human life on the planet in a path of strengthening sustainability especially in an era that is widely defined as Anthropocene. The Global Action Program (GAP) on Education and Sustainable Development was adopted based on the power of education and knowledge with the idea of ‘green universities’ aimed at improving the perception of sustainability for future policy decisions. Based on a Best-Worst (BW) scaling methodological approach, in this study we quantified the preferences of generation Y at University of Turin as they relate to issues explicitly connected to the ordinary consumption of food and the relationship between this and the perception of a sustainable approach.Data show that sustainability definitions belonging to the environmental and policy dimensions were the most closely related to the sustainability concept by the students interviewed while the economic and socio-cultural spheres were the least appreciated. In relation to food issues, students generally don't attribute high value to the assessment of local production. Few but significant differences were found in some specific topics between male and female groups with women perceiving sustainability consistently linked to the concept of local/territory and to the protection of the environment.

Performance Evaluation of Contract Employees Using the Best-Worst and Simple Additive Weighting Methods

All companies need qualified employees to ensure the continuity and progress of the company. Therefore, some companies are very selective in evaluating employee performance based on the criteria set by the company. However, because of the many criteria used in the assessment, a large number of contract employees to be evaluated, and the evaluation that must be proportional, the Human Resources department has difficulty evaluating the performance of contract employees. Therefore, this study aimed to develop a system for evaluating the performance of contract employees by integrating the Best-Worst (BW) and Simple Additive Weight (SAW) methods. The BW method is used to determine the weight of each criterion related to the performance appraisal of contract employees, and the SAW method is used to evaluate the performance of contract employees. The results showed that the system developed can provide a more proportional evaluation. So, this study contributes as a recommendation system for HR managers in determining eligible contract employees to have their work contracts extended based on criteria determined by the company.

Patient Preferences for Reducing Bowel Adverse Events following Prostate Radiotherapy

Background The Extended Prostate Cancer Index Composite (EPIC) instrument is a commonly used patient reported outcome (PRO) tool in prostate cancer clinical trials. Summary scores for EPIC subscales are calculated by averaging patient scores for attributes (e.g., side effects), implying equal weighting of the attributes in the absence of evidence showing otherwise. Methods We estimated patient preferences for each of the attributes included in the bowel subscale of the EPIC instrument using best-worst (B-W) scaling among a cohort of men with prostate cancer. Patients were presented with multiple tasks in which they were asked to indicate which attribute they would find most and least bothersome at different levels of severity. Analysis utilized both (simple) B-W counts and scores to estimate patient preferences for each attribute as well as attribute levels. Results A total of 174 respondents from two institutions participated in the survey. Preference estimates for each of the five attributes included in the EPIC-26 bowel subscale showed wide variation preferences: 'losing control of bowel movements' was found to be the most bothersome attribute, with a B-W score of -0.48, followed by bowel urgency which also had negative B-W score (-0.04). Increased frequency of bowel movements was the least bothersome attribute, with a B-W score of +0.33, followed by bloody stools (+0.12), and pelvic/rectal pain (+0.06). Analysis of preference weights for attribute bother levels showed preference estimates be linear. Conclusions We provide novel evidence on patient preferences for side effect reduction following prostate radiotherapy. Within the bowel sub-scale of the EPIC-26 short form, we found that bowel incontinence was perceived to be the most bothersome treatment effect, while increased bowel frequency was least bothersome to patients.

Patient preferences for reducing bowel adverse events following prostate radiotherapy.

BackgroundThe Extended Prostate Cancer Index Composite (EPIC) instrument is a commonly used patient reported outcome (PRO) tool in prostate cancer clinical trials. Summary scores for EPIC subscales are calculated by averaging patient scores for attributes (e.g., side effects), implying equal weighting of the attributes in the absence of evidence showing otherwise.MethodsWe estimated patient preferences for each of the attributes included in the bowel subscale of the EPIC instrument using best-worst (B-W) scaling among a cohort of men with prostate cancer. Patients were presented with multiple tasks in which they were asked to indicate which attribute they would find most and least bothersome at different levels of severity. Analysis utilized both (simple) B-W counts and scores to estimate patient preferences for each attribute as well as attribute levels.ResultsA total of 174 respondents from two institutions participated in the survey. Preference estimates for each of the five attributes included in the EPIC-26 bowel subscale showed wide variation preferences: ‘losing control of bowel movements’ was found to be the most bothersome attribute, with a B-W score of -0.48, followed by bowel urgency which also had negative B-W score (-0.04). Increased frequency of bowel movements was the least bothersome attribute, with a B-W score of +0.33, followed by bloody stools (+0.12), and pelvic/rectal pain (+0.06). Analysis of preference weights for attribute bother levels showed preference estimates be linear.ConclusionsWe provide novel evidence on patient preferences for side effect reduction following prostate radiotherapy. Within the bowel sub-scale of the EPIC-26 short form, we found that bowel incontinence was perceived to be the most bothersome treatment effect, while increased bowel frequency was least bothersome to patients.

Steady-State Power Quality Synthetic Evaluation Based on the Triangular Fuzzy BW Method and Interval VIKOR Method

With the increasing consumption of fossil fuels, renewable sources power generation has attracted more and more attention. However, with the integration of renewable energy and a large number of non-linear loads in power systems, several power quality problems are attracting the attention of researchers. At present, only national standards for an individual power quality index have been set in China. When evaluating power quality in practice, the individual standard cannot reflect a comprehensive level of power quality. In this paper, a synthetic evaluation method for steady-state power quality is proposed. Firstly, the traditional BW (best-worst) method is improved based on the triangular fuzzy number, to obtain the interval weight of each evaluation index. Then, the interval VIKOR method is used to evaluate the steady-state power quality monitoring data, and the final evaluation results are obtained. The validity of the proposed method is verified by the experimental data from the dynamic simulation laboratory of Tianjin University.

Challenges to informed consent for exome sequencing: A best-worst scaling experiment.

As exome sequencing expands as a diagnostic tool, patients and providers have voiced concerns about communicating the breadth and scope of potential results when obtaining informed consent. This study aimed to understand how genetic counselors prioritize essential components of the informed consent process and whether counselor factors influence these decisions. Development of a best-worst scaling experiment was informed by a systematic literature review and two focus groups. In all, 11 choice sets were created using a balanced incomplete block design, where participants selected the most and least important object in each set. Mean best-worst (BW) scores were calculated to summarize the relative importance of each object, and mediation analyses assessed whether responses were associated with genetic counselor factors and attitudes. In all, 342 members of the National Society of Genetic Counselors completed the online survey. Ranking of BW scores suggests that participants prioritize collaborative decision-making, assessing understanding and managing expectations, with the least emphasis placed on discussing technological complexities. Stratified analyses found that counselors more experienced with obtaining informed consent for exome sequencing and those reporting higher perceptions of patients' ability to manage information rated discussing variants of uncertain significance as significantly more important (p<.05). Our results suggest that genetic counselors report intentions to prioritize individual patient needs when obtaining informed consent for exome sequencing. Professional characteristics and attitudes may influence preemptive discussion of uncertain results.

A hybrid multi-objective optimization approach for energy-absorbing structures in train collisions

Energy-absorbing structure, which is the most effective and direct protection component, is installed at the front of the head car. However, structural optimization problems of this structure still exist, e.g., multiple conflicting objectives and the non-uniqueness problem of optimization solutions. This study formulates a novel optimization framework combining the theory of multi-objective optimization and multi-criteria decision making and proposes a hybrid optimization approach (M-BGV) that combines multi-objective artificial bee colony (MOABC), best worst (BW) method, grey relational analysis (GRA) and visekriterijumsko kompromisno rangiranje (VIKOR), to solve the structural optimization problem for energy-absorbing structures in train collisions. MOABC is applied to determine the points that represent the optimal solutions, i.e., the Pareto set. The preferences for the conflicting objectives for the certain practice condition/structure can be calculated by the BW method. An integrated multi-criteria decision making approach that combines GRA and VIKOR is proposed to obtain the optimal solution via evaluating the solutions from the Pareto set. Subsequently, an empirical application of a multi-cell thin-walled aluminum energy-absorbing structure is applied to demonstrate that this utilized integrated methodology is valid and practical. The results prove that this approach provides an accurate and effective tool for the structural multi-objective optimization problem.

Patients with AML Worry about More Than Just Dying: Quantifying Patient Experience Using Best-Worst Scaling

Background: Patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) face poor outcomes and treatments with significant and debilitating toxicities. New regimens with improved efficacy and an improved side effect profile are needed. Documenting patient experience can assist in identifying unmet needs and in fostering drug development. We sought to understand the experience of patients with AML by prioritizing their AML-related worries as part of a larger patient-focused drug development initiative led by The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.Methods: A robust community-centered approach was used to engage diverse expert and community stakeholders in the development of an instrument to prioritize patient worry. A pilot study was completed to refine the instrument which resulted in 13 patient-centered worries encompassing decision-making, treatment delivery, physical side effects, and psychosocial effects. To capture best-worst (BW) scores, patients were presented with repeated choice tasks prompting them to choose the attributes that they were most and least worried about among repeated subsets of attributes chosen using a balanced-incomplete block design. Results were analyzed using a conditional logistic regression with patients' choices of attributes as the dependent variable. A national survey of patients and caregivers was conducted with the instrument. Results were then compared with Likert ratings of the attributes for validation. Sub-group analysis compared patients currently in remission to those not in remission. Additional qualitative worries were also collected.Results: The survey was delivered to 5,353 potential participants. A total of 892 patients with AML participated; 832 completed all choice tasks. Patients were predominantly white (88%), married or partnered (72%), college-educated (66%), and privately-insured (79%). Many were currently employed (46%) while some were disabled (25%) or retired (22%). Most patients received an allogeneic stem cell transplant (64%) and the large majority (95%) were currently in remission. The mean time from diagnosis was 8 years (range = 1 - 40), and the mean age was 55 years (range = 19 - 87). Patients were most worried about “the possibility of dying from AML” (Regression result = 1.25, Standard Error (SE) = 0.030), followed by “long-term side effects of treatments” (Regression result = 1.05, SE = 0.030), “being a burden to others” (Regression result = 0.32, SE 0.029), and “returning to daily activities” (Regression result = 0.31, SE 0.028). Patients were least worried about “communicating openly with doctors” (Regression result = -1.25, SE 0.030), “having access to the best medical care” (Regression result = -0.75, SE 0.029) and “having enough information about AML” (Regression result = -0.62, SE 0.028). BW scores were highly correlated with Likert ratings (Spearman's rho = 0.93). Patients who were not in remission worried more about “knowing about all the treatment options” than “coping with the emotional demands of AML,” “short-term side effects of treatments,” “the overall financial cost of AML,” and “choosing a treatment in a short amount of time.” Overall, patients found it easy to understand the questions (78%), easy to answer all the questions (64%) and answered the questions consistently with their experience (89%).Conclusions: Identifying and prioritizing the worries of patients with AML are necessary to understand the experience of those affected by the disease. In this large, national sample representing mostly AML survivors, patients had the strongest worries about long-term clinical outcomes including the possibility of dying from their disease and the long-term side effects of therapy. Psychosocial effects were also worrisome including concerns about burdening others, returning to work, emotionally coping with AML, and the cost of treatment. Items related to treatment delivery and decision-making were less prioritized, perhaps illustrating the sufficient expertise and counseling from care providers. Patients who were not in remission were more concerned about understanding treatment options. Representing the largest study to date of the concerns of patients with AML, these data can serve to inform patient care and the development of new treatment options. DisclosuresO'Donoghue:The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society: Employment. Bridges:The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society: Research Funding.

Testing the stability of utility parameters in repeated best, repeated best-worst and one-off best-worst studies

Stated choice (SC) surveys are a key tool for studying travel behaviour and are used to inform policy decisions in many countries. Recently, the best-worst (BW) variant of SC has rapidly increased in popularity in fields as diverse as transport, marketing and health research. A key argument for its implementation has been that it is perceived to be easier for respondents to identify the best and the worst alternative in a choice set compared to identifying the second- or even third best. For elicitation formats asking respondents to consecutively identify the first, second and third best (etc.) alternative, labelled here as repeated best stages, it is well known that utility and scale parameters are generally not stable across the stages. Joint analysis of the responses to each stage may increase the efficiency of the utility and willingness-to-pay parameters (i.e. smaller standard errors), but incorrect inferences may be made if these parameters are not stable across the stages. This paper tests the stability of utility parameters for the repeated BW and one-off BW format. Using data from three different studies, we show that, regardless of the dataset and elicitation format used, the obtained utility parameters and willingness to pay estimates are not stable across stages. The results thereby question the use of BW data in applied work aimed at forecasting and understanding first (best) choices. Our findings thereby contradict recent discussions about potentially beneficial framing effects in BW surveys. The unique presence of corresponding data from a repeated best and repeated BW exercise in one survey highlights the observed rank-orders are highly consistent across the two elicitation formats and that any differences in marginal willingness to pay estimates can be attributed to the imposed econometric model rather than to differences in the behaviour of respondents.

Importance of Dwelling, Neighbourhood Attributes in Residential Location Modelling: Best Worst Scaling vs. Discrete Choice

Traditional discrete choice experiments do not differentiate between the intrinsic importance of an attribute and that associated with its levels of variation. It has been suggested recently that best-worst (B-W) scaling (Case 2) allows for this differentiation. Here we pool B-W answers with binary stated choice (SC) data to study the importance of dwelling and neighbourhood attributes for apartment seekers in the centre of Santiago, Chile. Previous research had shown how these diverse elicitation methods can be pooled (albeit without including any type of heterogeneity), suggesting that the “best” (as opposed to “worst”) responses are most compatible with the binary SC data. In this paper we extend this work to allow for heterogeneity in preferences through (a) systematic taste variations alone, (b) correct treatment of panel effects alone, and finally, (c) the combined effect of both. In all cases the best resulting model is obtained by pooling the “best” answers with the binary SC, under the assumption of common and specific attributes to each dataset. Nevertheless, when the model included only unobserved heterogeneity through error components (to treat the panel effect), the datasets did not pool as well as when we did not consider it. The joint model had half of the attributes specific to each dataset while in the previous case only two were specific. On the other hand, when considering observed and unobserved heterogeneity, the two datasets pooled better than in the other cases, needing to consider only one attribute as specific to each set (and the remaining seven as common). We also analysed how the inclusion of heterogeneity changed the attribute estimates. In particular, the scales that can be constructed for the attributes and for their levels of variation do not change their relative order, but the magnitudes do, especially in cases where the estimates were not significantly different from zero at the 95% confidence level.

Anchored vs. relative best–worst scaling and latent class vs. hierarchical Bayesian analysis of best–worst choice data: Investigating the importance of food quality attributes in a developing country

Applying best–worst (BW) scaling to a multifaceted feature, e.g. food quality, is challenging as attribute non-attendance or lack of attribute discrimination risks invalidating the transformation of choice data to unidimensional scale. The relativism of BW scaling also typically prevents distinction of respondents or groups of respondents based on similarities to the study object. A dual-response BW scaling method employed here to obtain an anchored scale allowed comparisons of importance ratings across individuals. Attribute importance ratings and rankings obtained were compared with those from relative BW scaling. Latent class (LC) and hierarchical Bayesian (HB) analyses of individual specific BW choice data were also compared for ability to consider within- and between-respondent choice heterogeneity. Personal interviews with 449 consumers provided data on the importance of 16 food quality attributes of kale produced in peri-urban farming in Kenya. Major findings were that the anchoring model improved individual choice predictions compared with conventional relativistic BW scaling, i.e. was more reliable in measuring consumer preferences, and that HB analysis fitted the data better than LC analysis. HB analysis also successfully obtained individual parameter estimates from sparse data and is thus a promising tool for analysis of BW choices in sensory and consumer-orientated research.

Chinese choices: a survey of wine consumers in Beijing

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the purchasing behaviours of two Beijing wine consumer groups and evaluate the influence of different factors on their decision making process to provide information to better understand the Chinese wine market and assist with market entry and penetration.Design/methodology/approachA questionnaire with 27 single choice or scoring questions and a set of 13 best–worst (BW) scaling questions is designed. Typical consumers in supermarkets and university students are invited to answer the questionnaire which uses a mix of nominal and rating scale responses as well as a BW choice experiment.FindingsThe results show that the consumers intend to pay low prices for daily use wines, but high prices for wines for gift purposes. Domestic brands constituted the highest proportion of the purchases, followed by French wines. The consumers are sensitive on price and country of wine origin; awards, medals, and vintage were of low influences in wine purchasing decisions. Typical consumers like supermarkets and boutique wine shops, while university students prefer the internet for on‐line sales. In the BW experiment, tasting the wine previously, the origin of the wine and brand name listed are the most influential factors in purchasing decisions.Originality/valueThe overall picture of wine preference of Beijing consumers is reported for the first time. It provides an understanding of the factors in wine purchasing decision making and their relative importance. The result could better facilitate wine promotion and penetration in this promising and unique market.

Consumer preferences of wine in Italy applying best‐worst scaling

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to focus on measuring the importance of the attributes, which influence the wine choice of Italian consumers when they buy wine either in a retail or an on‐premise setting, identifying significant behavioural differences across geo‐demographic subgroups of the sample.Design/methodology/approachThe best‐worst (BW) method was applied together with simple statistical methods to measure the degree of importance given by respondents to attributes, avoid rating bias problems, and compare potential market segments.FindingsA general analysis of BW scores showed that direct, personal and sensorial experiences are the most important attributes when choosing wine. The statistical analysis evidenced that, while choosing wine in retail stores, the level of involvement respondents have toward wine, the age of the interviewees and the geographical provenance of the respondents showed the greatest differences in attribute importance. Respondents in the on‐premise sector were more similar across the socio‐demographic groups compared to the retail respondents, with differences in the age and involvement having the greatest effect compared to other variables.Originality/valueThe BW method has never been applied in Italy so far. Moreover, it has never been used to measure preferences of Italian consumers for wine, either in the retail or in the on‐premise setting. The BW method allowed researchers to identify the attributes able to influence consumers choices for wine at most (and at least). Compared to other methodologies, this has been done avoiding problems of rating bias, favouring a cross regional comparison of the way diverse populations judge similar attributes.

Direct and indirect hedonic scaling methods: A comparison of the labeled affective magnitude (LAM) scale and best–worst scaling

Affective or hedonic measurement is a cornerstone of sensory science, because it provides critical information about individuals’ likes and dislikes for different products. Therefore, it is not surprising that debate about hedonic scaling is ongoing and that new methodology for hedonic scaling emerges regularly. The present research adds to this body of knowledge by comparing best–worst (BW) scaling, a choice-based methodology, with a direct scaling method, the labeled affective magnitude (LAM) scale. We begin with a literature review of direct and indirect scaling methods and then present two empirical studies that compare best–worst and LAM scaling. The key finding is that neither scaling method is superior to the other. However, what tentatively emerges is that choice of scaling method needs to be made in the context of the nature and complexity of the study to be conducted, the nature of the respondents, and the nature of the test samples themselves. With numerous criteria influencing the choice of hedonic scaling methodology, we advocate that researchers be explicit about the criteria that underlie their empirical work.