Abstract Since the attribute aggregation of the evidential reasoning approach with multiple-level hierarchical structures is implemented in a recursive way, the aggregation times are the number of the branch nodes of attribute tree, which results in a large amount of calculation. To reduce the amount of calculation, a non-recursive aggregation approach is proposed and its time complexity is compared with that of the recursive approach. To explore the accuracy and the nonlinear characteristics of the non-recursive approach to dealing with different belief distributions, the belief degrees and the utilities of the aggregated attribute are calculated in terms of the belief structures of harmony, quasi-harmony and conflict, respectively. The nonlinear characteristics of the two aggregation approaches are analyzed based on the comparison of formula derivation and experimental results, and the accuracy of the non-recursive approach is examined from the angle of relative errors. The experimental results and the numeric example show the effectiveness of the proposed approach.
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2014, Vol. 27 
