Conflict and Surprise: Heuristics for Model Revision

Any probabilistic model of a problem is based on assumptions which, if violated, invalidate the model. Users of probability based decision aids need to be alerted when cases arise that are not covered by the aid's model. Diagnosis of model failure is also necessary to control dynamic model construction and revision. This paper presents a set of decision theoretically motivated heuristics for diagnosing situations in which a model is likely to provide an inadequate representation of the process being modeled.