Mining consensus preference graphs from users' ranking data

The group ranking problem consists of constructing coherent aggregated results from preference data provided by decision makers. Traditionally, the output of a group ranking problem can be classified into ranking lists and maximum consensus sequences. In this study, we propose a consensus preference graph approach to represent the coherent aggregated results of users' preferences. The advantages of our approach are that (1) the graph is built based on users' consensuses, (2) the graph can be understood intuitively, and (3) the relationships between items can be easily seen. An algorithm is developed to construct the consensus preference graph from users' total ranking data. Finally, extensive experiments are carried out using synthetic and real data sets. The experimental results indicate that the proposed method is computationally efficient, and can effectively identify consensus graphs. Highlights? This study proposes a new output type of group ranking problem. ? The new output is a consensus preference graph of items. ? The output graph can be understood intuitively and the relationships between items can be easily seen. ? The experimental results show that the proposed method is efficient and effective.