2. Overview of AHP
• GP answers “how much?”, whereas AHP
answers “which one?”
• AHP developed by Saati
• Method for ranking decision alternatives
and selecting the best one when the
decision maker has multiple objectives, or
criteria
3. Examples
• Buying a house
– Cost, proximity of schools, trees, nationhood,
public transportation
• Buying a car
– Price, interior comfort, mpg, appearance, etc.
• Going to a college
–
4. Demonstrating AHP Technique
• Identified three potential location alternatives:
A,B, and C
• Identified four criteria: Market, Infrastructure,
Income level, and Transportation,
• 1st
level: Goal (select the best location)
• 2nd
level: How each of the 4 criteria contributes
to achieving objective
• 3rd
level: How each of the locations contributes
to each of the 4 criteria
5. General Mathematical Process
• Establish preferences at each of the levels
– Determine our preferences for each location
for each criteria
• A might have a better infrastructure over the other
two
– Determine our preferences for the criteria
• which one is the most important
– Combine these two sets of preferences to
mathematically derive a score for each
location
6. Pairwise Comparisons
• Used to score each
alternative on a
criterion
• Compare two
alternatives according
to a criterion and
indicate the
preference using a
preference scale
• Standard scale used
in AHP
Preference Level Numerical
Value
Equally preferred 1
Equally to moderately
preferred
2
Moderately preferred 3
Moderately to strongly
preferred
4
Strongly preferred 5
Strongly to very strongly
preferred
6
Very strongly preferred 7
Very strongly to extremely
preferred
8
Extremely preferred 9
7. Pairwise Comparison
• If A is compared with B
for a criterion and
preference value is 3,
then the preference value
of comparing B with A is
1/3
• Pairwise comparison
ratings for the market
criterion
• Any location compared to
itself, must equally
preferred
Market
location A B C
A 1 3 2
B 1/3 1 1/5
C 1/2 5 1
8. Other Pairwise Comparison
Income level
location A B C
A 1 6 1/3
B 1/6 1 1/9
C 3 9 1
Transportation
location A B C
A 1 1/3 1/2
B 3 1 4
C 2 1/4 1
Infrastructure
location A B C
A 1 1/3 1
B 3 1 7
C 1 1/7 1
Market
location A B C
A 1 3 2
B 1/3 1 1/5
C 1/2 5 1
9. Developing Preferences within Criteria
• Prioritize the decision
alternatives within each
criterion
• Referred to synthesization
– Sum the values in each
column of the pairwise
comparison matrices
– Divide each value in a column
by its corresponding column
sum to normalize preference
values
• Values in each column sum
to 1
– Average the values in each
row
• Provides the most preferred
alternative (A, C, B)
• Last column is called
preference vector
Market
location A B C
A 1 3 2
B 1/3 1 1/5
C 1/2 5 1
11/6 9 16/5
Market
location A B C
A 6/11 3/9 5/8
B 2/11 1/9 1/16
C 3/11 5/9 5/16
Market
location A B C Average
A 0.5455 0.333 0.6250 0.5012
B 0.1818 0.1111 0.0625 0.1185
C 0.2727 0.5556 0.3125 0.3803
10. Other Preference Vectors
Location Market Income Level Infrastructure Transportation
A 0.5012 0.2819 0.1780 0.1561
B 0.1185 0.0598 0.6850 0.6196
C 0.3803 0.6583 0.1360 0.2243
11. Ranking the Criteria
• Determine the relative
importance or weight of
the criteria
– which one is the most
important and which one is
the least important one
• Accomplished the same
way we ranked the
locations within each
criterion, using pairwise
comparison
Criteria
Market
Income
infrastructure
Transportatio
n
Market 1 1/5 3 4
Income 5 1 9 7
infrastructure 1/3 1/9 1 2
Transportation 1/4 1/7 1/2 1
13. Developing Overall Ranking
Location
Market
Income
Level
Infrastructure
Transportatio
n
A 0.5012 0.2819 0.1780 0.1561
B 0.1185 0.0598 0.6850 0.6196
C 0.3803 0.6583 0.1360 0.2243
Criteria
Average
Market 0.1993
Income 0.6535
Infrastructure 0.0860
Transportation 0.0612
Overall Score A= (0.1993)(0.5012)+(0.6535)(0.2819)+
(0.1780)(0.0860)+(0.1561)(0.0612)
=0.3091
Overall Score B =0.1595
Overall Score C =0.5314
Preference Vector
14. Summary
• Develop a pairwise comparison matrix for each decision
alternative for each criterion
• Synthesization
– Sum values in each column
– Divide each value in each column by the corresponding column
sum
– Average the values in each row (provides preference vector for
decision alternatives)
– Combine the preference vectors
• Develop the preference vector for criteria in the same
way
• Compute an overall score for each decision alternative
• Rank the decision alternatives
15. AHP Consistency
• Decision maker uses pairwise comparison to establish the
preferences using the preference scale
• In case of many comparisons, the decision maker may lose
track of previous responses
• Responses have to be valid and consistent from a set of
comparisons to another set
• Suppose for a criterion
– A is “very strongly preferred” to B and A is “moderately preferred”
to C
– C is “equally preferred” to B
– Not consistent with the previous comparisons
• Consistency Index (CI) measures the degree of
inconsistency in the pairwise comparisons
16. CI Computation
• Consider the pairwise
comparisons for the 4 criteria
• Multiply the Pairwise
Comparison Matrix by the
Preference Vector
• Divide each value by the
corresponding weights from
the preference vector
• If the decision maker was a
perfectly consistent decision
maker, then each of these
ratios would be exactly 4
• CI=(4.1564-n)/(n-1), where n
is the number of being
compared
Criteria
Market
Income
infrastructure
Transportatio
n
Market 1 1/5 3 4
Income 5 1 9 7
infrastructure 1/3 1/9 1 2
Transportation 1/4 1/7 1/2 1
.1993
.6535
.0860
.0612
*
Pairwise Comparison Matrix
Preference
Vector
(1)(0.1993)+ (1/5)(0.6535)+…+(4)(0.0612)=0.8328
(5)(0.1993)+ (1)(0.6535)+…+(9)(0.0612)=2.8524
(1/3)(0.1993)+ (1/9)(0.6535)+…+(2)(0.0612)=0.3474
(1/4)(0.1993)+ (1/7)(0.6535)+…+(1)(0.0612)=0.2473
0.8328/0.1993=4.1786
2.8524/06535=4.3648
0.3474/.0760=4.0401
0.2473/0.0612=4.0422
Ave =4.1564
17. Degree of Consistency
• CI=(4.1564-4)/(4-1)=0.0521
• If CI=0, there would a perfectly
consistent decision maker
• Determine the inconsistency
degree
• Determined by comparing CI
to a Random Index (RI)
• RI values depend on n
• Degree of consistency =CI/RI
• IF CI/RI <0.1, the degree of
consistency is acceptable
• Otherwise AHP is not
meaningful
• CI/RI=0.0521/0.90=0.0580<0.1
n 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
RI
0
0.58
0.90
1.12
1.24
1.32
1.41
1.45
1.51
18. Scoring Model
• Similar to AHP, but mathematically simpler
• Decision criteria are weighted in terms of their
relative importance
• Each decision alternative is graded in terms of
how well it satisfies the criteria using Si=Σgijwj,
where
– Wj=a weight between 0 and 1.00 assigned to criterion j
indicating its relative importance
– gij=a grade between 0 and 100 indicating how well the
decision alternative i satisfies criterion j
– Si=the total score for decision alternative i
19. Example
Decision Alternatives
Decision Criteria Weight Alt.1 Alt.2 Alt.3 Alt.4
Criterion 1 0.30 40 60 90 60
Criterion 2 0.25 75 80 65 90
Criterion 3 0.25 60 90 79 85
Criterion 4 0.10 90 100 80 90
Criterion 5 0.10 80 30 50 70
Weight assigned to each criterion indicates its relative importance
Grades assigned to each alternative indicate how well it satisfies each criterion
Si=Σgijwj=
(0.3)(40)+ (0.25)(75)+…+(0.10)(80)=62.75
(0.3)(60)+ (0.25)(80)+…+(0.10)(30)=73.50
(0.3)(90)+ (0.25)(65)+…+(0.10)(50)=76.00
(0.3)(60)+ (0.25)(90)+…+(0.10)(70)=77.75
20. Example
• Purchasing a mountain bike
• Three criteria: price, gear
action, weight/durability
• Three types of bikes: A,B,C
• Developed pairwise
comparison matrices I,II,III
• Ranked the decision criteria
based on the pairwise
comparison
• Select the best bike using
AHP
III-Weight/Durability
Bike A B C
A 1 3 1
B 1/3 1 1/2
C 1 2 1
Criteria Price Gear Weight
Price 1 3 5
Gear 1/3 1 2
Weight 1/5 1/2 1
I-Price
Bike A B C
A 1 3 6
B 1/3 1 2
C 1/6 2 1
II-Gear Action
Bike A B C
A 1 1/3 1/7
B 3 1 1/4
C 7 4 1