The thesis Defense session of Mr Hosseini , Sasan  with the title of “ Compiling a Decision Making Model for Selecting an Option in the Concept Formation Stage of the Architectural Design Process   ” under supervision of Dr.Daneshpour, will be held in 17 of Feb 2013 at 15:00  Pm in School of Architecture and environmentaldesign.

 

Abstract

Nowadays we are faced with complexities, uncertainty and many other factors in designing which effect the way in which the design takes form. The rate of the growth and the transformation of issues, the great mass of the influencing factors on designing in the different fields of architecture and the lack of managing these information leads to disorder in architecture- which is what is created by the mind(s) of the individual or a group. In analyzing architecture issues the architect is simultaneously faced with a great mass of fixed and variable factors. It is obvious that the lack of attention to all these variables at the same time can lead to failure in the presumable conclusions from the decisions made and this would bring about great defects. As an explanation of this subject, the human mind can’t concentrate on more than seven subjects at the same time and gets confused. This confusion is sometimes clear but sometimes the signs are shown after the completion of the design and even after it is constructed.

This research concentrates on a systematic design process and by examining the hypothesis of decision and rationality in decision making proposes to facilitate a part of these complications in the formation of the concept -with the assistance of a scientific model in order to select the best option. By this, it proposes to increase the solidarity, and clarity of the selection process with a decision support system which is the scientific model mentioned.

The decision support system, organizes the mind and thought in a systematic way. However it will not substitute for the decision maker. The decision support model is a tool with no intended answer in the hand of the decision maker and has the duty to organize what is on his/her mind and turn them into outcomes.

In this research the effective criteria for selecting the options derived from concept were extracted. The relation between the criteria is put in a model. The criteria and effective variables are rated and given importance. The decision support system model in choosing the right option was also designed. The domain of this research includes the recent influential architects of the recent era. This research falls in the research method of correlation. After selecting the statistical society and determining the mass sample, information was gathered through interviews and questionnaires. The factor analyzing method was used. After analyzing the information, the effective factors in the research were extracted and through an improved prioritizing analytic process, the relation between the criteria and variables were put in a model.

The result of this research is a decision support model for selecting an option in the concept formation stage. In order to evaluate the model there was a need for describing a set of criteria before hand. After the criteria was extracted and gathered, the model for accessing the amount of relation between the criteria by verifying the correlation hypothesis was made. After that the ultimate decision support model was designed. Considering the calculative essence of this model, a software was designed for the architect so as to forgo mathematical equations and be able speed up the information processing. In this model the improved prioritizing analytic process was used to rate criteria in different design issues. The decision making techniques “promethee” and “vikor” were used to assign priority and ranking equations. There for it is suggested that colleagues and professionals use this scientific decision support model in the course of evaluating and selection an option alongside their professional knowledge.

Keywords and professional research terms

Decision support system, classic rationality, limited rationality, evaluation and selection of an option