Group Decision Making and Group Recommendations

In this paper we analyze descriptions of group decision-making processes provided by 200 individuals organized in 55 groups. The goal of the paper is to show how such an analysis can be used when designing more efficient group recommender systems. To this end, we demonstrate that a) the provided group decision-making process descriptions can be systematically characterized by certain qualitatively identified aspects, b) the decision-making process that is adopted by a specific group is related to the characteristics of individuals in that group as well as to the characteristics of the group as a whole, and c) the decision reaching approach that a group naturally adopted can be determined, to a considerable extent, by certain characteristics of the group. Therefore, by examining real groups in a natural scenario, we can learn how a group recommender system should adapt when supporting group decision-making processes.