We use decision theory to compare variants of differential privacy from the perspective of prospective study participants. We posit the existence of a preference ordering on the set of potential consequences that study participants can incur, which enables the analysis of individual utility functions. Drawing upon the theory of measurement, we argue that changes in expected utilities should be measured via the classic Euclidean metric. We then consider the question of which privacy guarantees would be more appealing for individuals under different decision settings. Through our analysis, we found that the nature of the potential participant's utility function, along with the specific values of $\epsilon$ and $\delta$, can greatly alter which privacy guarantees are preferable.

翻译：我们运用决策理论，从潜在研究参与者的视角比较差分隐私的不同变体。我们假设参与者可能面临的后果集合上存在偏好排序，从而能够分析个体效用函数。借鉴测量理论，我们论证期望效用的变化应通过经典欧几里得度量来测量。进而探讨在何种隐私保证能在不同决策情境下对个体更具吸引力。通过分析发现，潜在参与者的效用函数性质以及 $\epsilon$ 和 $\delta$ 的具体取值，会显著改变隐私保证的优劣排序。