Biomedical subjects

Pekka Leskinen

Publications and source records attributed to Pekka Leskinen.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

Comparison of alternative scoring techniques when assessing decision maker's multi-objective preferences in natural resource management.

A popular way to assess a decision maker's preferences in multi-objective natural resource management is to ask the decision maker to compare alternative management plans pairwisely in the ratio scale. Several numerical scoring techniques have been proposed for the ratio scale comparisons, but the performance of the alternative techniques is not fully understood. At the same time, the choice of scoring technique potentially impacts the description of the decision maker's preferences and therefore the actual management decisions. In this paper, the regression model for the ratio scale pairwise comparisons is used, and the differences between the alternative scoring techniques are studied based on two different viewpoints. The first idea is to interpret the scoring techniques as fixed models and then compare them under fixed numerical scaling. The applicability of several potential decision-making strategies is discussed in this context. The second idea is to parameterise the scoring techniques and then compare them under optimal scaling. This was possible in an artificial experiment, where the true values of the alternatives are known. The results supported the use of a geometric scoring technique. Also, the importance of assessing an appropriate scale parameter of the geometric progression is pointed out.

Algorithms↗

PubMed2005

Multi-criteria natural resource management with preferentially dependent decision criteria.

The traditional assumption with multi-criteria natural resource management models is that the values of the decision alternatives with respect to one criterion can be assessed independently of the values of the decision alternatives with respect to other criteria. In practice, however, the assumption of independent decision criteria is not always realistic. For example, the importance of the amount of old forests to biodiversity may depend on the amount of dead wood. This paper shows how multi-criteria natural resource management problems can be analysed in a case involving dependent decision criteria. The proposed models are based on pair-wise comparisons of items in the ratio scale and statistical regression analysis of the pair-wise comparisons data. The basic idea behind the dependent models is to ask the decision maker (e.g. forest owner) to assess the decision alternatives or their characteristics simultaneously with respect to dependent decision criteria. The separate models for discrete and continuous cases are given, which enable the number of potential management alternatives to vary from a few to infinite. The models proposed allow a more realistic description of the decision problem in multi-criteria natural resource management.

Biodiversity↗

PubMed2005

Modelling ecological expertise for forest planning calculations-rationale, examples, and pitfalls.

Modern forestry increasingly often requires consideration of ecological objectives in planning calculations. A common problem in the integration of ecological objectives with forest planning is the lack of empirical models usable when evaluating the ecological merits of alternative forest treatment schedules. With respect to the habitat requirements of a threatened species, for example, the information might only be descriptive and scattered in numerous different case studies not directly exploitable with the forest area in question. A natural approach to alleviate these problems is to use existing ecological expertise in the form of expert judgments. This paper considers different possibilities for utilising ecological expertise in multi-objective forest planning through some practical examples. Special attention is paid to methodological issues concerning the collection and analysis of expert judgments. It is concluded that the modelling of ecological expertise is a useful tool in forest planning, but the inevitable uncertainties of expert judgments and the special pitfalls in modelling of expertise-as discussed in the paper-should be taken into account.

Conservation of Natural Resources↗