Using Stress Functions to Obtain OWA Operators

The ordered weighted averaging operator attempts to provide a user-friendly class of mean type aggregation operators by allowing a user to easily and naturally go from a mental model of a desired type of aggregation to its formal realization. Our objective in this paper is to support this agenda by providing a new methodology to help a user describe the type of aggregation they desire using the idea of a stress function. With this stress function, a user can "stress" which argument values they want to give more weight in the aggregation. An important feature of this stress function is that it is only required to be nonnegative function on the unit interval. This allows a user to completely focus on the issue of where to put the stress in the aggregation without having to consider satisfaction of any other requirements.