Toward Interactive and Intelligent Decision Support Systems: Volume 1 Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on Multiple Criteria Decision Making, Held at Kyoto, Japan, August 18 22, 1986

These proceedings include papers presented at the VII-th Internatio­ nal Conference on Multiple Criteria Decision Making which was held in Kyoto/Japan on August 18-22, 1986. Multiple Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) has been a greatly import­ ant subject in many practical fields, for example, in planning, design, control and management in both private and public sectors. After remark­ able developments of theory, methodology and pilot case studies in rec­ ent years, it is now facing the stage of real applications and develop­ ment of more sophisticated methodology as interactive intelligent decision support systems. The conference aimed to provide a significant contribu­ tion to the future of MCDM as one of total systems including human factors: Substantial emphasis was given to knowledge engineering and cognitive sci­ ence. The conference inherits the tradition and the style of the previous conferences: (1) Jouy-en-Josas/France (1975), (2) Buffalo/U.S.A. (1977), (3) Konigswinter/FRG (1978), (4) Delaware/U.S.A. (1980), (5) Mons/Belgium (1982), (6) Cleveland/U.S.A. (1984). This time a great many Japanese com­ panies provided grants for the conference. As a result, the total number of participants was over 120, and a computer demonstration could be reali­ zed on an extensive scale as well as the conference sessions. Throughout the conference, it was observed that MCDM is making steady progress not only in theory but also as a tool for decision support.