Control variates for monte carlo analysis of nonlinear statisticalmodels. IV

A Monte Carlo control variate method is used to study the estimators obtained in nonlinear regression under nonnormal error distributions. Two forms of the standard linear approximator are used as the control variates: a natural approximator using the nonnormal errors sampled, and a normalized approximator obtained by transformation of the errors. The natural approximator is shown to be most effective when the sampling distribution is itself nonnormal; its effectiveness is well approximated by a function of the Beale measure of nonlinearity. The normalized approximator is most effective when the estimator sampling distribution is approximately normal. A one-parameter model is used for illustration with uniform and gamma distributed errors     

A note on non-negative mean square error estimation of regression estimators in randomized response surveys

Generalized regression estimators are considered for the survey population total of a quantitative sensitive variable based on randomized responses. Formulae are presented for ‘non-negative’ estimators of approximate mean square errors of these biased estimators when population and sample sizes are large.     

The exact risks of some pre-test and stein-type regression estimators umder balanced loss

In regression analysis we are often interested in using an estimator which is “precise” and which simultaneously provides a model with “good fit”, In this paper we consider the risk properties of several estimators of the regression coefficient vector "trader “balanced” loss, This loss function (Zellner, 1994) reflects both of the described attributes. Under a particular form of balanced loss, we derive the predictive risk of the pre-test estimator which results after a test for exact linear restrictions on the coefficient vector. The corresponding risks of Stein-rule and positive-part Stein-rale estimators are also established. The risks based on loss functions which allow only for estimation precision, or only for goodness of fit, are special cases of our results, and we draw appropriate comparisons, In particular, we show that some of the well-known results under (quadratic) precision-only loss are not robust to our generalization of the loss function     

A comparison of some robust, adaptive, and partially adaptive estimators of regression models

Numerous estimation techniques for regression models have been proposed. These procedures differ in how sample information is used in the estimation procedure. The efficiency of least squares (OLS) estimators implicity assumes normally distributed residuals and is very sensitive to departures from normality, particularly to "outliers" and thick-tailed distributions. Lead absolute deviation (LAD) estimators are less sensitive to outliers and are optimal for laplace random disturbances, but not for normal errors. This paper reports monte carlo comparisons of OLS,LAD, two robust estimators discussed by huber, three partially adaptiveestimators, newey's generalized method of moments estimator, and an adaptive maximum likelihood estimator based on a normal kernal studied by manski. This paper is the first to compare the relative performance of some adaptive robust estimators (partially adaptive and adaptive procedures) with some common nonadaptive robust estimators. The partially adaptive estimators are based on three flxible parametric distributions for the errors. These include the power exponential (Box-Tiao) and generalized t distributions, as well as a distribution for the errors, which is not necessarily symmetric. The adaptive procedures are "fully iterative" rather than one step estimators. The adaptive estimators have desirable large sample properties, but these properties do not necessarily carry over to the small sample case.

The monte carlo comparisons of the alternative estimators are based on four different specifications for the error distribution: a normal, a mixture of normals (or variance-contaminated normal), a bimodal mixture of normals, and a lognormal. Five hundred samples of 50 are used. The adaptive and partially adaptive estimators perform very well relative to the other estimation procedures considered, and preliminary results suggest that in some important cases they can perform much better than OLS with 50 to 80% reductions in standard errors.     

A comparison of some robust,adaptive, and partially adaptive estimators of regression models

Numerous estimation techniques for regression models have been proposed. These procedures differ in how sample information is used in the estimation procedure. The efficiency of least squares (OLS) estimators implicity assumes normally distributed residuals and is very sensitive to departures from normality, particularly to "outliers" and thick-tailed distributions. Lead absolute deviation (LAD) estimators are less sensitive to outliers and are optimal for laplace random disturbances, but not for normal errors. This paper reports monte carlo comparisons of OLS,LAD, two robust estimators discussed by huber, three partially adaptiveestimators, newey's generalized method of moments estimator, and an adaptive maximum likelihood estimator based on a normal kernal studied by manski. This paper is the first to compare the relative performance of some adaptive robust estimators (partially adaptive and adaptive procedures) with some common nonadaptive robust estimators. The partially adaptive estimators are based on three flxible parametric distributions for the errors. These include the power exponential (Box-Tiao) and generalized t distributions, as well as a distribution for the errors, which is not necessarily symmetric. The adaptive procedures are "fully iterative" rather than one step estimators. The adaptive estimators have desirable large sample properties, but these properties do not necessarily carry over to the small sample case.

The monte carlo comparisons of the alternative estimators are based on four different specifications for the error distribution: a normal, a mixture of normals (or variance-contaminated normal), a bimodal mixture of normals, and a lognormal. Five hundred samples of 50 are used. The adaptive and partially adaptive estimators perform very well relative to the other estimation procedures considered, and preliminary results suggest that in some important cases they can perform much better than OLS with 50 to 80% reductions in standard errors.

     

Asymptotic approximations to the gain of the 2shi over stein estimators in linear regression models when the disturbances are small

The paper considers a new family of explicit or fully operational two-stage Stein or hierarchial information (2SHI) estimators for linear regression models, and provides an expression for the difference between the risks of these estimators and the usual Stein-rule estimator when the variance of the disturbance is small. The condition under which the 2SHI estimators have smaller average MSE than the Stein-rule estimator is also given.