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.     

Dependence Structure of a Class of Symmetric Distributions

Abstract

In this article, dependence structure of a class of symmetric distributions is considered. Let X and Y be two n-dimensional random vectors having such distributions. We investigate conditions on the generators of densities of X and Y such that X is MTP₂, and X and Y can be compared in the multivariate likelihood ratio order. Nonnegativity of the covariance between functions of two adjacent order statistics of X is also given.     

A note on efficient simulation of multidimensional spatial autoregressive processes

In applications of spatial statistics, it is necessary to compute the product of some matrix W of spatial weights and a vector y of observations. The weighting matrix often needs to be adapted to the specific problems, such that the computation of Wy cannot necessarily be done with available R-packages. Hence, this article suggests one possibility treating such issues. The proposed technique avoids the computation of the matrix product by calculating each entry of Wy separately. Initially, a specific spatial autoregressive process is introduced. The performance of the proposed program is briefly compared to a basic program using the matrix multiplication.     

Inferences Based on a Skipped Correlation Coefficient

The most popular method for trying to detect an association between two random variables is to test H ₀ ?:?ρ=0, the hypothesis that Pearson's correlation is equal to zero. It is well known, however, that Pearson's correlation is not robust, roughly meaning that small changes in any distribution, including any bivariate normal distribution as a special case, can alter its value. Moreover, the usual estimate of ρ, r, is sensitive to only a few outliers which can mask a true association. A simple alternative to testing H ₀ ?:?ρ =0 is to switch to a measure of association that guards against outliers among the marginal distributions such as Kendall's tau, Spearman's rho, a Winsorized correlation, or a so-called percentage bend correlation. But it is known that these methods fail to take into account the overall structure of the data. Many measures of association that do take into account the overall structure of the data have been proposed, but it seems that nothing is known about how they might be used to detect dependence. One such measure of association is selected, which is designed so that under bivariate normality, its estimator gives a reasonably accurate estimate of ρ. Then methods for testing the hypothesis of a zero correlation are studied.     

Selecting the Optimal Transformation of a Continuous Covariate in Cox's Regression: Implications for Hypothesis Testing

ABSTRACT

Background: Many exposures in epidemiological studies have nonlinear effects and the problem is to choose an appropriate functional relationship between such exposures and the outcome. One common approach is to investigate several parametric transformations of the covariate of interest, and to select a posteriori the function that fits the data the best. However, such approach may result in an inflated Type I error. Methods: Through a simulation study, we generated data from Cox's models with different transformations of a single continuous covariate. We investigated the Type I error rate and the power of the likelihood ratio test (LRT) corresponding to three different procedures that considered the same set of parametric dose-response functions. The first unconditional approach did not involve any model selection, while the second conditional approach was based on a posteriori selection of the parametric function. The proposed third approach was similar to the second except that it used a corrected critical value for the LRT to ensure a correct Type I error. Results: The Type I error rate of the second approach was two times higher than the nominal size. For simple monotone dose-response, the corrected test had similar power as the unconditional approach, while for non monotone, dose-response, it had a higher power. A real-life application that focused on the effect of body mass index on the risk of coronary heart disease death, illustrated the advantage of the proposed approach. Conclusion: Our results confirm that a posteriori selecting the functional form of the dose-response induces a Type I error inflation. The corrected procedure, which can be applied in a wide range of situations, may provide a good trade-off between Type I error and power.     

Application domains for the Delta method

The Delta method uses truncated Lagrange expansions of statistics to obtain approximations to their distributions. In this paper, we consider statistics Y=g(μ+X), where X is any random vector. We obtain domains 𝒟 such that, when μ∈𝒟, we may apply the distribution derived from the Delta method. Namely, we will consider an application on the normal case to illustrate our approach.     

Open Educational Resources and Institutional Repositories

ABSTRACT

This installment of The Balance Point column delves into the ways in which libraries create and store open educational resources (OER) in institutional repositories (IR), addressing issues such as preservation and versioning of OER content, copyright and licensing, funding, and staffing. Drawing on interviews and the literature, programs at institutions such as the University of Minnesota, the University of Kansas, and Grand Valley State University are highlighted.     

The n.s. conditions for the ration of two quadratic forms to have an f-distribution and its applications

Suppose that ξ and η be two random vectors and that (ξ^τ, η^τ have an elliptically contoured distribution or a multivariate normal distribution. In this article, we obtain some necessary and sufficient (N.S.) conditions such that the ratio of two quadratic forms, say ξ^τ Aξ and η^τ Bη(for some symmetric nonnegative matrices A and B), has an F-distribution. As applications, we extend the classical F-test to some dependent two group samples. Two cases are considered: elliptically contoured and normal distributions.     

Asymptotic Properties of OLS Estimates in Autoregressions with Bounded or Slowly Growing Deterministic Trends

ABSTRACT

We propose a general method of modeling deterministic trends for autoregressions. The method relies on the notion of L ₂-approximable regressors previously developed by the author. Some facts from the theory of functions play an important role in the proof. In its present form, the method encompasses slowly growing regressors, such as logarithmic trends, and leaves open the case of polynomial trends.     

GENERALIZED SIGNED-RANK ESTIMATORS FOR AUTOREGRESSION PARAMETERS

ABSTRACT

A new class of weighted signed-rank-based estimates for estimating the parameter vector of an autoregressive time series is considered. The Wilcoxon signed-rank estimate and the GR-estimates of Terpstra et al. (GR-Estimates for an Autoregressive Time Series. Statistics and Probability Letters 2001, 51, 165–172; Generalized Rank Estimates for an Autoregressive Time Series: A U-Statistic Approach. Statistical Inference for Stochastic Processes 2001, 4, 155–179) can be viewed as special cases of the so-called GSR-estimates. Asymptotic linearity properties are derived for the GSR-estimates. Based on these properties, and a symmetry assumption, the GSR-estimates are shown to be asymptotically normal at rate n ^1/2. The theory of U-Statistics along with a characterization of weak dependence that is inherent in stationary AR(p) models are the primary tools used to obtain the results. Tests of hypotheses as well as standard errors for confidence interval procedures can be based on such results. An efficiency study indicates that, for an appropriately chosen set of weights, the GSR-estimate is more efficient than the GR-estimate. Furthermore, the GSR-estimate has an added advantage in that an intercept term can be estimated simultaneously; unlike the GR-estimate. Two examples and a small simulation study are used to illustrate the computational and robust aspects of the GSR-estimates.     

Two graphical displays for the detection of potentially influential subsets in regression

In the context of the general linear model Y=Xβ+ε, the matrix P_z =Z(Z^TZ)^?1 Z^T , where Z=(X: Y), plays an important role in determining least squares results. In this article we propose two graphical displays for the off-diagonal as well as the diagonal elements of P_Z . The two graphs are based on simple ideas and are useful in the detection of potentially influential subsets of observations in regression. Since P_Z is invariant with respect to permutations of the columns of Z, an added advantage of these graphs is that they can be used to detect outliers in multivariate data where the rows of Z are usually regarded as a random sample from a multivariate population. We also suggest two calibration points, one for the diagonal elements of P_Z and the other for the off-diagonal elements. The advantage of these calibration points is that they take into consideration the variability of the off-diagonal as well as the diagonal elements of P_Z . They also do not suffer from masking.     

Some Properties of Weighted Distributions in the Context of Repairable Systems

ABSTRACT

In this article we introduce some structural relationships between weighted and original variables in the context of maintainability function and reversed repair rate. Furthermore, we prove some characterization theorems for specific models such as power, exponential, Pareto II, beta, and Pearson system of distributions using the relationships between the original and weighted random variables.     

Meta-Analysis Software: A Comparative Review

DSTAT, Version 1.10: Available from Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc., 10 Industrial Ave., Mahwah, NJ 07430-2262; phone: 800-926-6579

TRUE EPISTAT, Version 4.0: Available from Epistat Services, 2011 Cap Rock Circle, Richardson, TX 75080; phone: 214-680-1376; fax: 214-680-1303.

FAST*PRO, Version 1.0: Available from Academic Press, Inc., 955 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02139; phone: 800-321-5068; fax: 800-336-7377.

Meta-analysts conduct studies in which the responses are analytic summary measurements, such as risk differences, effect sizes, p values, or z statistics, obtained from a series of independent studies. The motivation for conducting a meta-analysis is to integrate research findings over studies in order to summarize the evidence about treatment efficacy or risk factors. This article presents a comparative review of three meta-analytic software packages: DSTAT, TRUE EPISTAT, and FAST*PRO.     

Robust Estimators for the Parameters of Multivariate Lognormal Distribution

Abstract

In this paper, we introduce a class of location and scale estimators for the p-variate lognormal distribution. These estimators are obtained by applying a log transform to the data, computing robust Fisher consistent estimators for the obtained Gaussian data and transforming those estimators for the lognormal using the relationship between the parameters of both distributions. We prove some of the properties of these estimators, such as Fisher consistency, robustness and asymptotic normality.     

Ohio Little Magazines

Abstract

The company now known as DC began as National Periodicals, publishing anthology series such as Adventure Comics, More Fun Comics, and Detective Comics. Superman, the first true “super-hero,” appeared on the scene in a brief story in Action Comics no. 1 (June, 1938). Batman appeared not long after, in the pages of Detective Comics no. 27 (May 1939)|3-and the world was never the same. In the late 1940s, National absorbed its competitor Ail-American Comics (which published such series as Green Lantern, Aquaman, and Green Arrow) and changed the company's name to Detective Comics, “DC” for short. The merger made DC the largest comic book company until the 1950s, when interest in the medium dried up, and Dell, who at that time published Walt Disney's comic books, took over the top spot.     

A new non parametric estimator for Pdf based on inverse gamma distribution

ABSTRACT

The non parametric approach is considered to estimate probability density function (Pdf) which is supported on(0, ∞). This approach is the inverse gamma kernel. We show that it has same properties as gamma, reciprocal inverse Gaussian, and inverse Gaussian kernels such that it is free of the boundary bias, non negative, and it achieves the optimal rate of convergence for the mean integrated squared error. Also some properties of the estimator were established such as bias and variance. Comparison of the bandwidth selection methods for inverse gamma kernel estimation of Pdf is done.     

Assessing point forecast accuracy by stochastic error distance

ABSTRACT

We propose point forecast accuracy measures based directly on distance of the forecast-error c.d.f. from the unit step function at 0 (“stochastic error distance,” or SED). We provide a precise characterization of the relationship between SED and standard predictive loss functions, and we show that all such loss functions can be written as weighted SEDs. The leading case is absolute error loss. Among other things, this suggests shifting attention away from conditional-mean forecasts and toward conditional-median forecasts.     

A central limit theorem for correlated variables with limited normal or gamma distributions

Abstract

Non-negative limited normal or gamma distributed random variables are commonly used to model physical phenomenon such as the concentration of compounds within gaseous clouds. This paper demonstrates that when a collection of random variables with limited normal or gamma distributions represents a stationary process for which the underlying variables have exponentially decreasing correlations, then a central limit theorem applies to the correlated random variables.     

Building a Collection of Canadian Newspapers

Abstract

This article discusses the functionality of the Dynix Serials Module. Core functions such as searching, check-in, claiming, and binding are described. Most serials work can be accomplished within this single module by selecting various options from several menu sets. The procedures described are based on Release 181 of the system. Serials Review 2002; 28:45–48.