Question

Jerome Bright, an administrative employee of uOttawa, has injured his hip in a fall and will need to undergo surgery. He is a bit overweight and he needs to lose some pounds before the surgery for it to be easier to perform, and have a quicker recovery afterwards. Dr. Passe presented him with a choice: (1) severe and immediate diet, or (2) moderate diet with metabolism boosting pill supplements. The doctor believed that if Jerome strictly followed either of these options, then he could indeed end up with optimal weight by the time he will undergo surgery.

An alternative option of “just exercise” (with no added requirement for diet or pills) is also available for Jerome, but will need a very high commitment from him to be able to achieve the same weight-loss results. Jerome is considering the “just exercise” option and the “optimal weight at surgery” state as most desirable, and he assigned it a score (payoff) of +10. Since it would be difficult to go on the severe diet, he assessed the score of “Severe Diet” and the “optimal weight at surgery” state as only +7, and finally, since he did not like taking pills, he assessed the score of “Moderate Diet + Pills” and the “optimal weight at surgery” state as only +8. He also gave a score of -9 to the case of “Still overweight” under the “Severe Diet” option, while assigning a score of -15 for the “Still overweight” after the “Moderate Diet” option that included taking pills. Finally, he assigned a score of -12 to the “Just exercise” and the “Still overweight” outcome.

Note: It is assumed that the only possible outcomes are: (1) “optimal weight at surgery”, or (2) “Still overweight”.

Help Jerome make a decision on which of the available options to carry out by writing out the payoff table and analyzing the problem.

Justify your selection of the appropriate option according to the

(a) Maximin criterion and then

(b) Minimax regret criterion.

Justify your advice in a report to Jerome using the two decision criteria to recommend in your report the best option.

Answer 1