Alternative covariance estimates in a replicated measurement error model with correlated,heteroscedastic errors

The article concerns covariance estimates in a replicated measurement error model with correlated, heteroscedastic errors. Freedman has conjectured that using more of the data will improve estimates of covariance matrices and result in a more efficient estimate of the coefficient of the regression model. The paper confirms the conjecture asymptotically for the case that all random variables are normally distributed, but the gain is not substantial.     

Robust replicated heteroscedastic measurement error model using heavy-tailed distribution

Heteroscedastic measurement error models are widely used in epidemiological, analytical chemistry, and other research areas. In this article, we propose a heteroscedastic measurement error model for replicated data under scale mixtures of normal distributions with/without equation error, which covers unpair and/or unequal replication cases. We obtain iterative formulas of maximum likelihood estimations via EM algorithm, and provide closed forms of asymptotic variances of the estimators. Simulation studies and a real data application are reported to investigate the effective and robust performances of the model and estimates.     

Bayesian inference in a heteroscedastic replicated measurement error model using heavy-tailed distributions

We introduce a multivariate heteroscedastic measurement error model for replications under scale mixtures of normal distribution. The model can provide a robust analysis and can be viewed as a generalization of multiple linear regression from both model structure and distribution assumption. An efficient method based on Markov Chain Monte Carlo is developed for parameter estimation. The deviance information criterion and the conditional predictive ordinates are used as model selection criteria. Simulation studies show robust inference behaviours of the model against both misspecification of distributions and outliers. We work out an illustrative example with a real data set on measurements of plant root decomposition.     

Statistical inference for partially time-varying coefficient errors-in-variables models

This paper studies the partially time-varying coefficient models where some covariates are measured with additive errors. In order to overcome the bias of the usual profile least squares estimation when measurement errors are ignored, we propose a modified profile least squares estimator of the regression parameter and construct estimators of the nonlinear coefficient function and error variance. The proposed three estimators are proved to be asymptotically normal under mild conditions. In addition, we introduce the profile likelihood ratio test and then demonstrate that it follows an asymptotically χ²${\chi }^2$ distribution under the null hypothesis. Finite sample behavior of the estimators is investigated via simulations too.     

Estimation of nonlinear errors-in-variables models: an approximate solution

We propose an easy to derive and simple to compute approximate least squares or maximum likelihood estimator for nonlinear errors-in-variables models that does not require the knowledge of the conditional density of the latent variables given the observables. Specific examples and Monte Carlo studies demonstrate that the bias of this approximate estimator is small even when the magnitude of the variance of measurement errors to the variance of measured covariates is large. Cheng Hsiao and Qing Wang's work was supported in part by National Science Foundation grant SeS91-22481 and SBR94-09540. Liqun Wang gratefully acknowledges the financial support from Swiss National Science Foundation. We wish to thank Professor H. Schneeweiss and a referee for helpful comments and suggestions.     

Pseudo-empirical Bayes estimation of small area means under a nested error linear regression model with functional measurement errors

Small area estimation is studied under a nested error linear regression model with area level covariate subject to measurement error. Ghosh and Sinha (2007) obtained a pseudo-Bayes (PB) predictor of a small area mean and a corresponding pseudo-empirical Bayes (PEB) predictor, using the sample means of the observed covariate values to estimate the true covariate values. In this paper, we first derive an efficient PB predictor by using all the available data to estimate true covariate values. We then obtain a corresponding PEB predictor and show that it is asymptotically “optimal”. In addition, we employ a jackknife method to estimate the mean squared prediction error (MSPE) of the PEB predictor. Finally, we report the results of a simulation study on the performance of our PEB predictor and associated jackknife MSPE estimator. Our results show that the proposed PEB predictor can lead to significant gain in efficiency over the previously proposed PEB predictor. Area level models are also studied.     

A fiducial p-value approach for comparing heteroscedastic regression models

To study the equality of regression coefficients in several heteroscedastic regression models, we propose a fiducial-based test, and theoretically examine the frequency property of the proposed test. We numerically compare the performance of the proposed approach with the parametric bootstrap (PB) approach. Simulation results indicate that the fiducial approach controls the Type I error rates satisfactorily regardless of the number of regression models and sample sizes, whereas the PB approach tends to be a little of liberal in some scenarios. Finally, the proposed approach is applied to an analysis of a real dataset for illustration.     

Prediction and forecasting in linear models with measurement error

We consider measurement error models within the time series unobserved component framework. A variable of interest is observed with some measurement error and modelled as an unobserved component. The forecast and the prediction of this variable given the observed values is given by the Kalman filter and smoother along with their conditional variances. By expressing the forecasts and predictions as weighted averages of the observed values, we investigate the effect of estimation error in the measurement and observation noise variances. We also develop corrected standard errors for prediction and forecasting accounting for the fact that the measurement and observation error variances are estimated by the same sample that is used for forecasting and prediction purposes. We apply the theory to the Yellowstone grizzly bears and US index of production datasets.     

Empirical likelihood for heteroscedastic partially linear errors-in-variables model with α-mixing errors

In this paper, we apply the empirical likelihood method to heteroscedastic partially linear errors-in-variables model. For the cases of known and unknown error variances, the two different empirical log-likelihood ratios for the parameter of interest are constructed. If the error variances are known, the empirical log-likelihood ratio is proved to be asymptotic chi-square distribution under the assumption that the errors are given by a sequence of stationary α-mixing random variables. Furthermore, if the error variances are unknown, we show that the proposed statistic is asymptotically standard chi-square distribution when the errors are independent. Simulations are carried out to assess the performance of the proposed method.     

Estimation in Varying-Coefficient Errors-in-Variables Models with Missing Response Variables

This article is concerned with the estimation of a varying-coefficient regression model when the response variable is sometimes missing and some of the covariates are measured with additive errors. We propose a class of estimators for the coefficient functions, as well as for the population mean and the error variance. The resulting estimators are shown to be asymptotically normal. Simulation studies are conducted to illustrate our approach.     

A new confidence interval in errors-in-variables model with known error variance

This paper considers constructing a new confidence interval for the slope parameter in the structural errors-in-variables model with known error variance associated with the regressors. Existing confidence intervals are so severely affected by Gleser–Hwang effect that they are subject to have poor empirical coverage probabilities and unsatisfactory lengths. Moreover, these problems get worse with decreasing reliability ratio which also result in more frequent absence of some existing intervals. To ease these issues, this paper presents a fiducial generalized confidence interval which maintains the correct asymptotic coverage. Simulation results show that this fiducial interval is slightly conservative while often having average length comparable or shorter than the other methods. Finally, we illustrate these confidence intervals with two real data examples, and in the second example some existing intervals do not exist.     

Structural inference of the parameters of the heteroscedastic simultaneous equation model

The structural approach of inference for the parameters of a simultaneous equation model with heteroscedastic error variance is investigated in this paper. The joint and the marginal structural distributions for the coefficients of the exogenous variables and the scale parameters of the error variables, and the marginal likelihood function of the coefficients of the endogenous variables have been derived. The estimates are directly obtainable from the structural distribution and the marginal likelihood function of the parameters. The marginal distribution of a subset of coefficients of exogenous variables provides the basis for making inference for a particular subset of parameter of interest.     

Sparsity identification for high-dimensional partially linear model with measurement error

In this article, we studied the identification of significant predictors in partially linear model in which some regressors are contaminated with random errors. Moreover, the dimension of parametric component is divergent and the regression coefficients are sparse. We applied difference technique to remove the nonparametric component for circumventing the selection of bandwidth, and constructed a bias-corrected shrinking estimator for the coefficient by using smoothly clipped absolute deviation (SCAD) penalty. Then, we derived the estimating and selecting consistency and established the asymptotic distribution for the identified significant estimators. Finally, Monte Carlo studies illustrate the performance of our approach.     

A heteroscedastic measurement error model based on skew and heavy-tailed distributions with known error variances

In this paper, we study inference in a heteroscedastic measurement error model with known error variances. Instead of the normal distribution for the random components, we develop a model that assumes a skew-t distribution for the true covariate and a centred Student's t distribution for the error terms. The proposed model enables to accommodate skewness and heavy-tailedness in the data, while the degrees of freedom of the distributions can be different. Maximum likelihood estimates are computed via an EM-type algorithm. The behaviour of the estimators is also assessed in a simulation study. Finally, the approach is illustrated with a real data set from a methods comparison study in Analytical Chemistry.     

Empirical likelihood based diagnostics for heteroscedasticity in partially linear errors-in-variables models

A standard assumption in regression analysis is homogeneity of the error variance. Violation of this assumption can have adverse consequences for the efficiency of estimators. In this paper, we propose an empirical likelihood based diagnostic technique for heteroscedasticity in the partially linear errors-in-variables models. Under mild conditions, a nonparametric version of Wilk's theorem is derived. Simulation results reveal that our test performs well in both size and power.     

Robust bootstrap estimates in heteroscedastic semi-varying coefficient models and applications in analyzing Australia CPI data

This article deals with the estimation of the parametric component, which is of primary interest, in the heteroscedastic semi-varying coefficient models. Based on the bootstrap technique, we present a procedure for estimating the parameters, which can provide a reliable approximation to the asymptotic distribution of the profile least-square (PLS) estimator. Furthermore, a bootstrap-type estimator of covariance matrix is developed, which is proved to be a consistent estimator of the covariance matrix. Moreover, some simulation experiments are conducted to evaluate the finite sample performance for the proposed methodology. Finally, the Australia CPI dataset is analyzed to demonstrate the application of the methods.     

Maximum likelihood estimation of variance components of heteroscedastic random anova model

the estimation of variance components of heteroscedastic random model is discussed in this paper. Maximum Likelihood (ML) is described for one-way heteroscedastic random models. The proportionality condition that cell variance is proportional to the cell sample size, is used to eliminate the efffect of heteroscedasticity. The algebraic expressions of the estimators are obtained for the model. It is seen that the algebraic expressions of the estimators depend mainly on the inverse of the variance-covariance matrix of the observation vector. So, the variance-covariance matrix is obtained and the formulae for the inversions are given. A Monte Carlo study is conducted. Five different variance patterns with different numbers of cells are considered in this study. For each variance pattern, 1000 Monte Carlo samples are drawn. Then the Monte Carlo biases and Monte Carlo MSE’s of the estimators of variance components are calculated. In respect of both bias and MSE, the Maximum Likelihood (ML) estimators of variance components are found to be sufficiently good.     

Empirical likelihood based diagnostics for heteroscedasticity in semiparametric varying-coefficient partially linear errors-in-variables models

In this paper, we propose an empirical likelihood based diagnostic technique for heteroscedasticity in the semiparametric varying-coefficient partially linear errors-in-variables models. Under mild conditions, a nonparametric version of Wilk’s theorem is derived. Simulation results reveal that our test performs well in both size and power.