Decision Support System and Multi-Criteria Decision Aid: A State of the Art and Perspectives JAMIL RAZMAK a and BELAID AOUNI b * a Laurentian University, Sudbury, ON, Canada, P3E2C6 b Department of Management and Marketing, College of Business and Economics, Qatar University, Doha, P.O. Box 2713, Qatar ABSTRACT The aim of this paper is to highlight the role of the Decision Support System within the field of multi-criteria decision aid (MCDA). The MCDA tools have been incorporated into systems to create Multi-Criteria Decision Support Systems (MCDSSs). In our literature review, we noticed that more than 100 papers have been written over a 20-year period in which MCDSS was used as a decision-making tool. The present paper describes some real applications of MCDSS in different fields, harmoniously combined with decision-making methods such as analytic hierarchy process, Utility Additive, and Goal Programming. The present study proposes an integrative MCDSS evaluation through guidance on the tools most useful for a specific user with a particular decision problem. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. KEY WORDS: Decision Support System; Multi-Criteria Decision Aid; Multi-Objective Programming; Typology. 1. INTRODUCTION The decision-making process becomes more and more complex and involving. This process requires the aggregation of several incommensurable and conflicting dimensions. The Multi Criteria Decision Aid (MCDA) is a branch of the operational research discipline that addresses complex decision-making problems featuring high uncertainty and conflicting objectives (Wang et al., 2010). These methods provide better understanding of the decision-making process, and they can be divided into MCDA, Multi- objective Programming (MOP), and Multi-Attribute Decision Analysis. These tools help the decision maker (DM) to make the choice of the best compromise. The Decision Support Systems (DSS) have been developed to support MCDA methods for facilitating decision-making process. The DSS is a technology and application that assists the DM in utilizing data through models to solve semi-structured and unstructured problems (Qian et al., 2004). In addition, French (1992) describes DSS as a tool that can help the DM to make the best choice that integrates its preferences. Therefore, some DSS go further and work with the subjective perspectives, judgements, beliefs, and preferences of the DM. In fact, this paper led to different types of DSS including Intelligent Decision Support System (IDSS). IDSSs are tools to help the decision-making process where uncertainty or incomplete information exists and where decisions involving risk must be made using human judgement and preferences (Jantan et al., 2010). The IDSSs are part of the Artificial Intelligence with the main objective of filling the gap between decision-making tools and human interactions (Turban et al., 2007). In a more precise way, the DSSs are developed to achieve many roles such as organizing the overflow of information and knowledge and helping the DM in elucidating his/her judgement and preferences. Recently, some studies have presented the concept of Intelligent Multi-criteria Decision Support Systems and its application to real decision-making contexts (Deng et al., 2010; Wibowo and Deng, 2011). In general, these studies highlight the contribution of the DSS as a support for the utilization of the MCDA methods to deal with some complex decision-making situations. In Section 2, we present the basic concepts of MCDA-based DSS, by highlighting the role of the DSS in the decision-making process. In addition, we outline and review some applications of MCDSS within some fields of application. In Section 3, we present a classification by field of MCDSS appli- cations. Some concluding remarks are presented in Section 4. *Correspondence to: Department of Management and Mar- keting, College of Business and Economics, Qatar University, Doha, P.O. Box 2713, Qatar. E-mail: belaid.aouni@qu.edu.qa Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Received 10 October 2012 Accepted 26 May 2014 JOURNAL OF MULTI-CRITERIA DECISION ANALYSIS J. Multi-Crit. Decis. Anal. (2014) Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/mcda.1530