A logic multi-criteria recommender system for tourist services: Jimataa

Abstract Emerging tourist destinations face several challenges, including a lack of data on travellers, as well as indicators to strengthen the competitiveness of the city’s services, reliability and tourist security. This paper describes a recommender system based on multi-criteria logic aggregation operators called Jimataa. The method of analysis is based on graded conjunctive-disjunctive operators and asymmetric assignment of a penalty or reward score regarding mandatory and optional criteria satisfaction. Several criteria are included for the evaluation of suitability, such as location, category, food specialities, other visitors scores, or services available. This system has deployed in Riohacha (Colombia) and it has been tested with end users by means of a survey. The web recommender system received a satisfaction rating of 86.42%, and the ease of data entry was rated with 77.78%. In the data entry process, 91.36% of users gave a maximum rating. These results indicate the efficiency of the system both in its recommendations and in the simplicity of the data entry process. This web recommender is a new technological product that can help emerging destinations by providing visitors with personalised, user-oriented tools and, on the other hand, improving the management of tourist services when providers do not have the capacity to maintain information on traditional platforms or social networks.