In statistical decision theory, a randomised decision rule or mixed decision rule is a decision rule that associates probabilities with deterministic decision rules. In finite decision problems, randomised decision rules define a risk set which is the convex hull of the risk points of the nonrandomised decision rules.
As nonrandomised alternatives always exist to randomised Bayes rules, randomisation is not needed in Bayesian statistics, although frequentist statistical theory sometimes requires the use of randomised rules to satisfy optimality conditions such as minimax, most notably when deriving confidence intervals and hypothesis tests about discrete probability distributions.
