A class of local likelihood methods and near-parametric asymptotics

The local maximum likelihood estimate θ^ _t of a parameter in a statistical model f ( x , θ) is defined by maximizing a weighted version of the likelihood function which gives more weight to observations in the neighbourhood of t . The paper studies the sense in which f ( t , θ^ _t ) is closer to the true distribution g ( t ) than the usual estimate f ( t , θ^) is. Asymptotic results are presented for the case in which the model misspecification becomes vanishingly small as the sample size tends to ∞. In this setting, the relative entropy risk of the local method is better than that of maximum likelihood. The form of optimum weights for the local likelihood is obtained and illustrated for the normal distribution.     

Semiparametric methods for response-selective and missing data problems in regression

Suppose that data are generated according to the model f ( y | x ; θ ) g ( x ), where y is a response and x are covariates. We derive and compare semiparametric likelihood and pseudolikelihood methods for estimating θ for situations in which units generated are not fully observed and in which it is impossible or undesirable to model the covariate distribution. The probability that a unit is fully observed may depend on y , and there may be a subset of covariates which is observed only for a subsample of individuals. Our key assumptions are that the probability that a unit has missing data depends only on which of a finite number of strata that ( y , x ) belongs to and that the stratum membership is observed for every unit. Applications include case–control studies in epidemiology, field reliability studies and broad classes of missing data and measurement error problems. Our results make fully efficient estimation of θ feasible, and they generalize and provide insight into a variety of methods that have been proposed for specific problems.     

Likelihood Ratio Tests Under Local and Fixed Alternatives in Monotone Function Problems

Abstract.  We focus on a class of non-standard problems involving non-parametric estimation of a monotone function that is characterized by n ^1/3 rate of convergence of the maximum likelihood estimator, non-Gaussian limit distributions and the non-existence of     -regular estimators. We have shown elsewhere that under a null hypothesis of the type ψ ( z ₀) =  θ ₀ ( ψ being the monotone function of interest) in non-standard problems of the above kind, the likelihood ratio statistic has a 'universal' limit distribution that is free of the underlying parameters in the model. In this paper, we illustrate its limiting behaviour under local alternatives of the form ψ _n ( z ), where ψ _n (·) and ψ (·) vary in O ( n ^−1/3) neighbourhoods around z ₀ and ψ _n converges to ψ at rate n ^1/3 in an appropriate metric. Apart from local alternatives, we also consider the behaviour of the likelihood ratio statistic under fixed alternatives and establish the convergence in probability of an appropriately scaled version of the same to a constant involving a Kullback–Leibler distance.     

Semiparametric Likelihood Based Method for Goodness of Fit Tests and Estimation in Upgraded Mixture Models

We use Owen's (1988, 1990) empirical likelihood method in upgraded mixture models. Two groups of independent observations are available. One is z ₁, ..., z _n which is observed directly from a distribution F ( z ). The other one is x ₁, ..., x _m which is observed indirectly from F ( z ), where the x _i s have density ∫ p ( x | z ) dF ( z ) and p ( x | z ) is a conditional density function. We are interested in testing H ₀: p ( x | z ) = p ( x | z ; θ ), for some specified smooth density function. A semiparametric likelihood ratio based statistic is proposed and it is shown that it converges to a chi-squared distribution. This is a simple method for doing goodness of fit tests, especially when x is a discrete variable with finitely many values. In addition, we discuss estimation of θ and F ( z ) when H ₀ is true. The connection between upgraded mixture models and general estimating equations is pointed out.     

An explanation of generalized profile likelihoods

Let X, T, Y be random vectors such that the distribution of Y conditional on covariates partitioned into the vectors X = x and T = t is given by f(y; x, ), where = (, (t)). Here is a parameter vector and (t) is a smooth, real–valued function of t. The joint distribution of X and T is assumed to be independent of and . This semiparametric model is called conditionally parametric because the conditional distribution f(y; x, ) of Y given X = x, T = t is parameterized by a finite dimensional parameter = (, (t)). Severini and Wong (1992. Annals of Statistics 20: 1768–1802) show how to estimate and (·) using generalized profile likelihoods, and they also provide a review of the literature on generalized profile likelihoods. Under specified regularity conditions, they derive an asymptotically efficient estimator of and a uniformly consistent estimator of (·). The purpose of this paper is to provide a short tutorial for this method of estimation under a likelihood–based model, reviewing results from Stein (1956. Proceedings of the Third Berkeley Symposium on Mathematical Statistics and Probability, vol. 1, University of California Press, Berkeley, pp. 187–196), Severini (1987. Ph.D Thesis, The University of Chicago, Department of Statistics, Chicago, Illinois), and Severini and Wong (op. cit.).     

Simulations on the Jelinski-Moranda model of software reliability; application of some parametric bootstrap methods

In software reliability theory many different models have been proposed and investigated. some of these models intuitively match reality better than others. The properties of certain statistical estimation procedures in connection with these models are also model-dependent. In this paper we investigate how well the maximum likelihood estimation procedure and the parametric bootstrap behave in the case of the very well-known software reliability model suggested by Jelinski and Moranda (1972). For this study we will make use of simulated data.     

Score Tests for Zero-Inflation in Overdispersed Count Data

The negative binomial (NB) model and the generalized Poisson (GP) model are common alternatives to Poisson models when overdispersion is present in the data. Having accounted for initial overdispersion, we may require further investigation as to whether there is evidence for zero-inflation in the data. Two score statistics are derived from the GP model for testing zero-inflation. These statistics, unlike Wald-type test statistics, do not require that we fit the more complex zero-inflated overdispersed models to evaluate zero-inflation. A simulation study illustrates that the developed score statistics reasonably follow a χ² distribution and maintain the nominal level. Extensive simulation results also indicate the power behavior is different for including a continuous variable than a binary variable in the zero-inflation (ZI) part of the model. These differences are the basis from which suggestions are provided for real data analysis. Two practical examples are presented in this article. Results from these examples along with practical experience lead us to suggest performing the developed score test before fitting a zero-inflated NB model to the data.     

A variance shift model for detection of outliers in the linear mixed measurement error models

ABSTRACT

In this paper, we extend a variance shift model, previously considered in the linear mixed models, to the linear mixed measurement error models using the corrected likelihood of Nakamura (1990 Nakamura, T. (1990). Corrected score function for errors in variables models: methodology and application to generalized linear models. Biometrika 77:127–137.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). This model assumes that a single outlier arises from an observation with inflated variance. We derive the score test and the analogue of the likelihood ratio test, to assess whether the ith observation has inflated variance. A parametric bootstrap procedure is implemented to obtain empirical distributions of the test statistics. Finally, results of a simulation study and an example of real data are presented to illustrate the performance of proposed tests.     

Properties of Bayes Factors Based on Test Statistics

Abstract.  This article examines the consistency, interpretation and application of Bayes factors constructed from standard test statistics. Primary conclusions are that Bayes factors based on multinomial and normal test statistics are consistent for suitable choices of the hyperparameters used to specify alternative hypotheses, and that such constructions can be extended to obtain consistent Bayes factors based on likelihood ratio statistics. A connection between Bayes factors based on likelihood ratio statistics and the Bayesian information criterion is exposed, as is a connection between Bayes factors based on F statistics and parametric Bayes factors based on normal-inverse gamma models. Similarly, Bayes factors based on chi-squared statistics for multinomial data are shown to provide accurate approximations to Bayes factors based on multinomial/Dirichlet models. An illustration of how the simple form of these Bayes factors can be exploited to generate easily interpretable summaries of the experimental 'weight of evidence' is provided.     

OPTIMAL SOFTWARE RELEASE POLICY BASED ON MARKOVIAN PERFECT DEBUGGING MODEL

In this paper we consider a Markovian perfect debugging model for which the software failure is caused by two types of faults, one which is easily detected and the other which is difficult to detect. When a failure occurs, a perfect debugging is immediately performed and consequently one fault is reduced from fault contents. We also treat the debugging time as a variable to develop a new debugging model. Based on the perfect debugging model, we propose an optimal software release policy that satisfies the requirements for both software reliability and expected number of faults which are required to achieve before releasing the software. Several measures, including the distribution of first passage time to the specified number of removed faults, are also obtained using the proposed debugging model.     

Statistical Inference and Applications of Mixture of Varying Coefficient Models

In this paper, we consider a new mixture of varying coefficient models, in which each mixture component follows a varying coefficient model and the mixing proportions and dispersion parameters are also allowed to be unknown smooth functions. We systematically study the identifiability, estimation and inference for the new mixture model. The proposed new mixture model is rather general, encompassing many mixture models as its special cases such as mixtures of linear regression models, mixtures of generalized linear models, mixtures of partially linear models and mixtures of generalized additive models, some of which are new mixture models by themselves and have not been investigated before. The new mixture of varying coefficient model is shown to be identifiable under mild conditions. We develop a local likelihood procedure and a modified expectation–maximization algorithm for the estimation of the unknown non‐parametric functions. Asymptotic normality is established for the proposed estimator. A generalized likelihood ratio test is further developed for testing whether some of the unknown functions are constants. We derive the asymptotic distribution of the proposed generalized likelihood ratio test statistics and prove that the Wilks phenomenon holds. The proposed methodology is illustrated by Monte Carlo simulations and an analysis of a CO₂‐GDP data set.     

Model fitting and inference under latent equilibrium processes

This paper presents a methodology for model fitting and inference in the context of Bayesian models of the type f(Y | X,θ)f(X|θ)f(θ), where Y is the (set of) observed data, θ is a set of model parameters and X is an unobserved (latent) stationary stochastic process induced by the first order transition model f(X ^(t+1)|X ^(t),θ), where X ^(t) denotes the state of the process at time (or generation) t. The crucial feature of the above type of model is that, given θ, the transition model f(X ^(t+1)|X ^(t),θ) is known but the distribution of the stochastic process in equilibrium, that is f(X|θ), is, except in very special cases, intractable, hence unknown. A further point to note is that the data Y has been assumed to be observed when the underlying process is in equilibrium. In other words, the data is not collected dynamically over time. We refer to such specification as a latent equilibrium process (LEP) model. It is motivated by problems in population genetics (though other applications are discussed), where it is of interest to learn about parameters such as mutation and migration rates and population sizes, given a sample of allele frequencies at one or more loci. In such problems it is natural to assume that the distribution of the observed allele frequencies depends on the true (unobserved) population allele frequencies, whereas the distribution of the true allele frequencies is only indirectly specified through a transition model. As a hierarchical specification, it is natural to fit the LEP within a Bayesian framework. Fitting such models is usually done via Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC). However, we demonstrate that, in the case of LEP models, implementation of MCMC is far from straightforward. The main contribution of this paper is to provide a methodology to implement MCMC for LEP models. We demonstrate our approach in population genetics problems with both simulated and real data sets. The resultant model fitting is computationally intensive and thus, we also discuss parallel implementation of the procedure in special cases.     

Estimating functions in indirect inference

Summary.  There are models for which the evaluation of the likelihood is infeasible in practice. For these models the Metropolis–Hastings acceptance probability cannot be easily computed. This is the case, for instance, when only departure times from a G / G /1 queue are observed and inference on the arrival and service distributions are required. Indirect inference is a method to estimate a parameter θ in models whose likelihood function does not have an analytical closed form, but from which random samples can be drawn for fixed values of θ . First an auxiliary model is chosen whose parameter β can be directly estimated. Next, the parameters in the auxiliary model are estimated for the original data, leading to an estimate     . The parameter β is also estimated by using several sampled data sets, simulated from the original model for different values of the original parameter θ . Finally, the parameter θ which leads to the best match to     is chosen as the indirect inference estimate. We analyse which properties an auxiliary model should have to give satisfactory indirect inference. We look at the situation where the data are summarized in a vector statistic T , and the auxiliary model is chosen so that inference on β is drawn from T only. Under appropriate assumptions the asymptotic covariance matrix of the indirect estimators is proportional to the asymptotic covariance matrix of T and componentwise inversely proportional to the square of the derivative, with respect to θ , of the expected value of T . We discuss how these results can be used in selecting good estimating functions. We apply our findings to the queuing problem.     

Improved hypothesis testing in a general multivariate elliptical model

This paper investigates improved testing inferences under a general multivariate elliptical regression model. The model is very flexible in terms of the specification of the mean vector and the dispersion matrix, and of the choice of the error distribution. The error terms are allowed to follow a multivariate distribution in the class of the elliptical distributions, which has the multivariate normal and Student-t distributions as special cases. We obtain Skovgaard's adjusted likelihood ratio (LR) statistics and Barndorff-Nielsen's adjusted signed LR statistics and we compare the methods through simulations. The simulations suggest that the proposed tests display superior finite sample behaviour as compared to the standard tests. Two applications are presented in order to illustrate the methods.     

Multivariate testing and model-checking for generalized order statistics with applications

The exponential family structure of the joint distribution of generalized order statistics is utilized to establish multivariate tests on the model parameters. For simple and composite null hypotheses, the likelihood ratio test (LR test), Wald's test, and Rao's score test are derived and turn out to have simple representations. The asymptotic distribution of the corresponding test statistics under the null hypothesis is stated, and, in case of a simple null hypothesis, asymptotic optimality of the LR test is addressed. Applications of the tests are presented; in particular, we discuss their use in reliability, and to decide whether a Poisson process is homogeneous. Finally, a power study is performed to measure and compare the quality of the tests for both, simple and composite null hypotheses.     

Chi-Squared Type Test for the AFT-Generalized Inverse Weibull Distribution

The generalized inverse Weibull distribution is a newlife time probability distribution which can be used to model a variety of failure characteristics. It has several desirable properties and nice physical interpretations which enable them to be used frequently. In this article, we present a chi-squared goodness-of-fit test for an accelerated failure time (AFT) model with generalized inverse Weibull distribution (GIW) as the baseline distribution, in both of complete and censored data. This test is based on a modification of the NRR (Nikulin-Rao-Robson) statistic Y², proposed by Bagdonavicius and Nikulin (2011 Bagdonavicius, V., Nikulin, M. (2011). Chi-squared tests for general composite hypotheses from censored samples. Comptes Rendus Mathematique, Ser. I, 349(3–4): 219–223.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), for censored data. Two applications of real data are given to illustrate the potentiality of the proposed test.     

Optimum release time of a software under periodic debugging schedule

In this paper, we study the problem of finding the optimal release time of a software meant to be marketed over a finite time horizon. The optimal design scheme considers reduction of the whole cost, achievement of a specified reliability with some high probability, or a combination of the both. We assume that the software is debugged periodically and the bug detection rates in the pre-release and post-release periods are different. We derive the optimal solution in each case. We also demonstrate the utility of the results through simulations, leading to different types of graphs showing the relationship between the target reliability, specified budget and the optimal number of additional debugging periods.     

New results on the likelihood ratio and score tests for the von Mises distribution

In this paper, we derive Bartlett and Bartlett-type corrections [G.M. Cordeiro and S.L.P. Ferrari 1991, A modified score test statistic having chi-squared distribution to order n ^?1 , Biometrika 78 (1991), pp. 573–582] to improve the likelihood ratio and Rao's score statistics for testing the mean parameter and the concentration parameter in the von Mises distribution. Simple formulae are suggested for the corrections valid for small and large values of the concentration parameter that do not depend on the modified Bessel functions and can be useful in practical applications.     

On Minimum Distance Estimation Using Kolmogorov-Lévy Type Metrics

Let X ₁, . . ., X_n be independent identically distributed random variables with a common continuous (cumulative) distribution function (d.f.) F , and F^_n the empirical d.f. (e.d.f.) based on X ₁, . . ., X_n . Let G be a smooth d.f. and Gθ = G (·–θ) its translation through θ∈ R . Using a Kolmogorov-Lévy type metric ρ_α defined on the space of d.f.s. on R , the paper derives both null and non-null limiting distributions of √ n [ ρ_α ( F_n , Gθ_n ) – ρ_α ( F, G_θ )], √ n (θ _n –θ) and √ nρ_α ( Gθ , Gθ ), where θ _n and θ are the minimum ρ_α -distance parameters for F_n and F from G , respectively. These distributions are known explicitly in important particular cases; with some complementary Monte Carlo simulations, they help us clarify our understanding of estimation using minimum distance methods and supremum type metrics. We advocate use of the minimum distance method with supremum type metrics in cases of non-null models. The resulting functionals are Hadamard differentiable and efficient. For small scale parameters the minimum distance functionals are close to medians of the parent distributions. The optimal small scale models result in minimum distance estimators having asymptotic variances very competitive and comparable with best known robust estimators.     

Multiplicative-interaction logit models for i×j×2 three-way tables

Multiplicative-interaction (M-I) logit models are proposed for three-way IxJx2 contingency tables where the third variable constitutes a binary response. Models are derived by assigning unknown scores to the categories and forming product interactions from them. Asymptotic results under special sampling constraints are derived for maximum likelihood estimates and the goodness-of-fit statistics. The class of models proposed in this paper are found to be useful when no obvious scores are available. An example is included.