Serious Games as a Validation Tool for PREDIS: A Decision Support System for Disaster Management

Area of Science:

• Disaster Management
• Decision Support Systems
• Serious Games

Background:

• Disaster response requires efficient decision-making for optimal resource allocation.
• Existing methods for disaster impact prediction and supplier selection can be time-consuming.
• Bridging the expertise gap between disaster management professionals and non-experts is crucial.

Purpose of the Study:

• To validate the PREDIS (PREdictive model for DISaster response supplier selection) decision support system.
• To assess PREDIS's effectiveness in speeding up decision-making and improving non-expert performance.
• To evaluate the system's ability to facilitate expert-level decisions among non-experts.

Main Methods:

• A quasi-experiment design using a participatory simulation game.
• Collected expert judgments on the PREDIS system's performance.
• Compared decisions using Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) weights and Borda counts.

Main Results:

• PREDIS reduced decision-making time for experts and non-experts from 72 hours to 6 hours post-disaster.
• 71% of non-experts made decisions comparable to those of experts.
• The system effectively predicted disaster impact and optimized supplier selection.

Conclusions:

• PREDIS significantly enhances the speed and quality of disaster response decision-making.
• The system democratizes disaster management capabilities, enabling non-experts to perform at expert levels.
• PREDIS offers a valuable tool for immediate disaster impact prediction and resource allocation optimization.