Approaching rank aggregation problems by using evolution strategies: The case of the optimal bucket order problem

The optimal bucket order problem consists in obtaining a complete consensus ranking (ties are allowed) from a matrix of preferences (possibly obtained from a database of rankings). In this paper, we tackle this problem by using evolution strategies. We designed specific mutation operators which are...

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Bibliographic Details
Authors: Aledo Sánchez, Juan Ángel, Gámez Martín, José Antonio, Rosete-Suárez, Alejandro
Format: article
Publication Date:2018
Country:España
Institution:Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha
Repository:RUIdeRA. Repositorio Institucional de la UCLM
OAI Identifier:oai:ruidera.uclm.es:10578/28324
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejor.2018.04.031
http://hdl.handle.net/10578/28324
Access Level:Open access
Keyword:Combinatorial optimization
Rank aggregation
Optimal bucket order problem
Weak order
Evolution strategies
Consensus ranking
Description
Summary:The optimal bucket order problem consists in obtaining a complete consensus ranking (ties are allowed) from a matrix of preferences (possibly obtained from a database of rankings). In this paper, we tackle this problem by using evolution strategies. We designed specific mutation operators which are able to modify the inner structure of the buckets, which introduces more diversity into the search process. We also study different initialization methods and strategies for the generation of the population of descendants. The proposed evolution strategies are tested using a benchmark of 52 databases and compared with the current state-of-the-art algorithm LIA. We carry out a standard machine learning statistical analysis procedure to identify a subset of outstanding configurations of the proposed evolution strategies. The study shows that the best evolution strategy improves upon the accuracy obtained by the standard greedy method (BPA) by 35%, and that of LIA by 12.5%.