Making Even Swaps Even Easier

This paper introduces an approach to support different phases of the Even Swaps process by Preference Programming, which is a framework for modeling incomplete information within multiattribute value theory. In the approach, the Even Swaps process is carried out as usual, but in parallel the preferences of the decision maker are modeled with a Preference Programming model, which is also updated with the information obtained from the even swaps. This provides us information to help (i) identify practically dominated alternatives, and (ii) find applicable candidates for the next even swap. The approach can be applied without compromising the original idea of ease of use. Our new Smart-Swaps web software is used to demonstrate the method in practice.