Fuzzy multi-criteria acceptability analysis: A new approach to multi-criteria decision analysis under fuzzy environment

Uncertainty is one of the main difficulties that increases the complexity of multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) problems, and often uncertainty cannot be managed by probabilistic models. In such cases, the use of fuzzy methods has been successfully applied to multi-criteria decision methods in which the ranking of fuzzy quantities is crucial for the decision analysis. This paper aims to introduce a new approach to MCDA problems defined under fuzzy contexts that implements the concept of acceptability analysis, Fuzzy Multi-Criteria Acceptability Analysis (FMAA), based on the Fuzzy Rank Acceptability Analysis (FRAA), that provides a ranking and a confidence degree about the ranking of fuzzy quantities. Based on the fuzzy extension of MAVT method, the FMAA is implemented and then applied to a case study, and its results are compared with other well-known MCDA methods in order to show its validity, interpretability and consistency.