ABSTRACT
Decision Support Systems (DSS) are interactive computer models or information aids designed to assist managerial judgment in unstructured tasks. Among proponents of DSS, it is an article of faith that interactive aids to problem-solving improve the effectiveness and managerial decision making. This chapter presents some propositions about the impact of a DSS on individual problem-solving that provide both a theoretical framework and some practical criteria for systems design. It focuses on the marginal economics of effort, the manager's subjective assessment of the relative cognitive effort--the perceived costs--of adopting the DSS in relation to the likely improvement in the quality of the decision made. A DSS is a problem-solving aid that either lowers the cost of carrying out an existing mode of analysis or encourages the individual to increase his or her level of reaction from routine to adaptive or adaptive to fundamental.
