A Modified TOPSIS Approach with Three-Way Decision

Abstract

In real life, multiple attribute decision problems (MADM) can be applied in different areas and numerous related extensions and methodologies have been proposed by researchers. Combining three-way TOPSIS decision ideas with MADM is a feasible and meaningful research direction. In light of this, this paper generalizes the classical TOPSIS method with the help of mean and standard deviation and proposes the so-called modified three-way TOPSIS. First, using a pair of thresholds which is derived by mean and standard deviation, we divide decision alternatives into three segments, and then a preliminary rank results of decision alternatives can be obtained. Furthermore, in each decision region, we use two ranking regulations (one-way TOPSIS or modified two-way TOPSIS method) to rank decision alternatives. A practical example of urban expressway route selection illustrates the feasibility of the proposed method. Finally, we test the feasibility and validity of the modified three-way TOPSIS method by comparing with some existing method.