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A multiple secretary problem with switch costs

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dc.contributor.advisor Dan Ariely. en_US
dc.contributor.author Ding, Jiachuan en_US
dc.contributor.other Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Computation for Design and Optimization Program. en_US
dc.date.accessioned 2008-05-19T16:13:12Z
dc.date.available 2008-05-19T16:13:12Z
dc.date.copyright 2007 en_US
dc.date.issued 2007 en_US
dc.identifier.uri http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/41735
dc.description Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Computation for Design and Optimization Program, 2007. en_US
dc.description Includes bibliographical references (p. 76). en_US
dc.description.abstract In this thesis, we utilize probabilistic reasoning and simulation methods to determine the optimal selection rule for the secretary problem with switch costs, in which a known number of applicants appear sequentially in a random order, and the objective is to maximize the sum of the qualities of all hired secretaries over all time. It is assumed that the quality of each applicant is uniformly distributed and any hired secretary can be replaced by a better qualified one at a constant switch cost. A dynamic program is formulated and the optimal selection rule for the single secretary case is solved. An approximate solution is given for the multiple secretary case, in which we are allowed to have more than one secretary at a time. An experiment was designed to simulate the interview process, in which respondents were sequentially faced with random numbers that represent the qualities of different applicants. Finally, the experimental results are compared against the optimal selection strategy. en_US
dc.description.provenance Made available in DSpace on 2008-05-19T16:13:12Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 225093042.pdf: 3800572 bytes, checksum: 50d24224d52107d674f1baa944971b3b (MD5) 225093042-MIT.pdf: 3800382 bytes, checksum: e5fc38ea0eb44901a570d481f35af5bf (MD5) Previous issue date: 2007 en
dc.description.statementofresponsibility by Jiachuan Ding. en_US
dc.format.extent 76 p. en_US
dc.language.iso eng en_US
dc.publisher Massachusetts Institute of Technology en_US
dc.rights M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission. en_US
dc.rights.uri http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582 en_US
dc.subject Computation for Design and Optimization Program. en_US
dc.title A multiple secretary problem with switch costs en_US
dc.type Thesis en_US
dc.description.degree S.M. en_US
dc.contributor.department Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Computation for Design and Optimization Program. en_US
dc.identifier.oclc 225093042 en_US

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