Abstract. A theory of questionnaires is development in the direction of studying the questionnaires features with questions with equal number of outcomes (homogeneous questionnaires). A special attention is given to ternary questionnaires in which the questions have three outcomes. Such questionnaires may be used to solve a wide range of discrete search, identification, and technical diagnostics tasks. Com-pared to binary questionnaires, ternary questionnaires may turn out to be questionnaires with a much lower cost for identical sets of identifiable events. The advantage is considered as a significant one when maximum cost of the questionnaire is limited, e. g., in the tasks of technical diagnostics with limited time for diagnosis. The questionnaires in which the questions allow for occurrence of errors, and the answers – for uncertainties, are studied. Methods of constructing questionnaires with errors and uncertainties for the matrix form of the task are described, and specifics of optimization of such questionnaires are con-sidered.

Keywords: event identification, technical diagnostics, theory of questionnaires, homogeneous questionnaires, binary questionnaires, ternary questionnaires, errors in answers, uncertain answers, questionnaire formation

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