Testing a block exchangeable covariance matrix

Testing hypotheses about the structure of a covariance matrix for doubly multivariate data is often considered in the literature. In this paper the Rao's score test (RST) is derived to test the block exchangeable covariance matrix or block compound symmetry (BCS) covariance structure under the assumption of multivariate normality. It is shown that the empirical distribution of the RST statistic under the null hypothesis is independent of the true values of the mean and the matrix components of a BCS structure. A significant advantage of the RST is that it can be performed for small samples, even smaller than the dimension of the data, where the likelihood ratio test (LRT) cannot be used, and it outperforms the standard LRT in a number of contexts. Simulation studies are performed for the sample size consideration, and for the estimation of the empirical quantiles of the null distribution of the test statistic. The RST procedure is illustrated on a real data set from the medical studies.     

Using power transformations when approximating quantiles

Estimators are obtained tor quantiles of survival distributions. This is accomplished by approximating Lritr distribution of the transtorrneri data, where the transformation used is that of Box and Cox (1964). The normal approximation as in Box and Cox and, in addition, the extreme value approximation are considered. More generally, to use the methods given, the approximating distribution must come from a location-scale family. For some commonly used survival random variables T the performance of the above approximations are evaluated in terms of the ratio of the true quantiles of T to the estimated one, in the long run. This performance is also evaluated for lower quantiles using simulated lognormai, Weibull and gamma data. Several examples are given to illustrate the methodology herein, including one with actual data.     

Assessing a hypothesis test for the difference between two quantiles from independent populations

An empirical distribution function estimator for the difference of order statistics from two independent populations can be used for inference between quantiles from these populations. The inferential properties of the approach are evaluated in a simulation study where different sample sizes, theoretical distributions, and quantiles are studied. Small to moderate sample sizes, tail quantiles, and quantiles which do not coincide with the expectation of an order statistic are identified as problematic for appropriate Type I error control.     

Near-exact distributions for the sphericity likelihood ratio test statistic

In this paper three near-exact distributions are developed for the sphericity test statistic. The exact probability density function of this statistic is usually represented through the use of the Meijer G function, which renders the computation of quantiles impossible even for a moderately large number of variables. The main purpose of this paper is to obtain near-exact distributions that lie closer to the exact distribution than the asymptotic distributions while, at the same time, correspond to density and cumulative distribution functions practical to use, allowing for an easy determination of quantiles. In addition to this, two asymptotic distributions that lie closer to the exact distribution than the existing ones were developed. Two measures are considered to evaluate the proximity between the exact and the asymptotic and near-exact distributions developed. As a reference we use the saddlepoint approximations developed by Butler et al. [1993. Saddlepoint approximations for tests of block independence, sphericity and equal variances and covariances. J. Roy. Statist. Soc., Ser. B 55, 171–183] as well as the asymptotic distribution proposed by Box.     

Saddlepoint Approximation for Sample Quantiles with Some Applications

In this article, we use the integral form of the binomial distribution to derive saddlepoint approximations for sample quantiles. As an application, we present the calculation of the tail probability of the empirical log-likelihood ratio statistic for quantiles. Simulation results are also given to show that our approximations are extremely accurate.     

Change-Point Tests for the Error Distribution in Non-parametric Regression

Abstract.  Several testing procedures are proposed that can detect change-points in the error distribution of non-parametric regression models. Different settings are considered where the change-point either occurs at some time point or at some value of the covariate. Fixed as well as random covariates are considered. Weak convergence of the suggested difference of sequential empirical processes based on non-parametrically estimated residuals to a Gaussian process is proved under the null hypothesis of no change-point. In the case of testing for a change in the error distribution that occurs with increasing time in a model with random covariates the test statistic is asymptotically distribution free and the asymptotic quantiles can be used for the test. This special test statistic can also detect a change in the regression function. In all other cases the asymptotic distribution depends on unknown features of the data-generating process and a bootstrap procedure is proposed in these cases. The small sample performances of the proposed tests are investigated by means of a simulation study and the tests are applied to a data example.     

Development and comparative study of two near-exact approximations to the distribution of the product of an odd number of independent Beta random variables

Using the concept of near-exact approximation to a distribution we developed two different near-exact approximations to the distribution of the product of an odd number of particular independent Beta random variables (r.v.'s). One of them is a particular generalized near-integer Gamma (GNIG) distribution and the other is a mixture of two GNIG distributions. These near-exact distributions are mostly adequate to be used as a basis for approximations of distributions of several statistics used in multivariate analysis. By factoring the characteristic function (c.f.) of the logarithm of the product of the Beta r.v.'s, and then replacing a suitably chosen factor of that c.f. by an adequate asymptotic result it is possible to obtain what we call a near-exact c.f., which gives rise to the near-exact approximation to the exact distribution. Depending on the asymptotic result used to replace the chosen parts of the c.f., one may obtain different near-exact approximations. Moments from the two near-exact approximations developed are compared with the exact ones. The two approximations are also compared with each other, namely in terms of moments and quantiles.     

Comparing two dependent groups via quantiles

This paper considers two general ways dependent groups might be compared based on quantiles. The first compares the quantiles of the marginal distributions. The second focuses on the lower and upper quantiles of the usual difference scores. Methods for comparing quantiles have been derived that typically assume that sampling is from a continuous distribution. There are exceptions, but generally, when sampling from a discrete distribution where tied values are likely, extant methods can perform poorly, even with a large sample size. One reason is that extant methods for estimating the standard error can perform poorly. Another is that quantile estimators based on a single-order statistic, or a weighted average of two-order statistics, are not necessarily asymptotically normal. Our main result is that when using the Harrell–Davis estimator, good control over the Type I error probability can be achieved in simulations via a standard percentile bootstrap method, even when there are tied values, provided the sample sizes are not too small. In addition, the two methods considered here can have substantially higher power than alternative procedures. Using real data, we illustrate how quantile comparisons can be used to gain a deeper understanding of how groups differ.     

Study of the quality of several asymptotic and near-exact approximations based on moments for the distribution of the Wilks Lambda statistic

In this paper a measure of proximity of distributions, when moments are known, is proposed. Based on cases where the exact distribution is known, evidence is given that the proposed measure is accurate to evaluate the proximity of quantiles (exact vs. approximated). The measure may be applied to compare asymptotic and near-exact approximations to distributions, in situations where although being known the exact moments, the exact distribution is not known or the expression for its probability density function is not known or too complicated to handle. In this paper the measure is applied to compare newly proposed asymptotic and near-exact approximations to the distribution of the Wilks Lambda statistic when both groups of variables have an odd number of variables. This measure is also applied to the study of several cases of telescopic near-exact approximations to the exact distribution of the Wilks Lambda statistic based on mixtures of generalized near-integer gamma distributions.     

Book Reviews

The Levene test is a widely used test for detecting differences in dispersion. The modified Levene transformation using sample medians is considered in this article. After Levene's transformation the data are not normally distributed, hence, nonparametric tests may be useful. As the Wilcoxon rank sum test applied to the transformed data cannot control the type I error rate for asymmetric distributions, a permutation test based on reallocations of the original observations rather than the absolute deviations was investigated. Levene's transformation is then only an intermediate step to compute the test statistic. Such a Levene test, however, cannot control the type I error rate when the Wilcoxon statistic is used; with the Fisher–Pitman permutation test it can be extremely conservative. The Fisher–Pitman test based on reallocations of the transformed data seems to be the only acceptable nonparametric test. Simulation results indicate that this test is on average more powerful than applying the t test after Levene's transformation, even when the t test is improved by the deletion of structural zeros.     

Accurate inference for scale and location families

A great deal of inference in statistics is based on making the approximation that a statistic is normally distributed. The error in doing so is generally O(n^?1/2), where n is the sample size and can be considered when the distribution of the statistic is heavily biased or skewed. This note shows how one may reduce the error to O(n^?(j+1)/2), where j is a given integer. The case considered is when the statistic is the mean of the sample values of a continuous distribution with a scale or location change after the sample has undergone an initial transformation, which may depend on an unknown parameter. The transformation corresponding to Fisher's score function yields an asymptotically efficient procedure.     

Testing for Granger-causality in quantiles

This paper proposes a consistent parametric test of Granger-causality in quantiles. Although the concept of Granger-causality is defined in terms of the conditional distribution, most articles have tested Granger-causality using conditional mean regression models in which the causal relations are linear. Rather than focusing on a single part of the conditional distribution, we develop a test that evaluates nonlinear causalities and possible causal relations in all conditional quantiles, which provides a sufficient condition for Granger-causality when all quantiles are considered. The proposed test statistic has correct asymptotic size, is consistent against fixed alternatives, and has power against Pitman deviations from the null hypothesis. As the proposed test statistic is asymptotically nonpivotal, we tabulate critical values via a subsampling approach. We present Monte Carlo evidence and an application considering the causal relation between the gold price, the USD/GBP exchange rate, and the oil price.     

Mixed Graphical Model Selection Using Holm's Procedure

The problem of selecting a graphical model is considered as a performing simultaneously multiple tests. The control of the overall Type I error on the selected graph is done using the so famous Holm's procedure. We prove that when we use a consistent edge exclusion test the selected graph is asymptotically equal to the true graph with probability at least equal to a fixed level 1 ? α. This method is then used for the selection of mixed concentration graph models by performing the χ²-edge exclusion test. We also apply the method to two classical examples and to simulated data. We compare the overall error of the selected model with the one obtained using the stepwise method. We establish that the control is better when we use the Holm's procedure.     

Designs for discrimination between binary response models

We propose a test statistic for discrimination between alternative univariate binary response models which is asymptotically equivalent to the likelihood ratio statistic and Pearson's goodness of fit statistic. We propose an optimal design procedure. Under certain conditions we prove that the maximum value of the power can be obtained when the degrees of freedom of the test statistic is one. Several mathematical properties of the incomplete gamma function ratio and the non-central chi-squared distribution are required in the discussion and these are established.     

Tests for noncorrelation of two multivariate ARMA time series

In many situations, we want to verify the existence of a relationship between multivariate time series. In this paper, we generalize the procedure developed by Haugh (1976) for univariate time series in order to test the hypothesis of noncorrelation between two multivariate stationary ARMA series. The test statistics are based on residual cross-correlation matrices. Under the null hypothesis of noncorrelation, we show that an arbitrary vector of residual cross-correlations asymptotically follows the same distribution as the corresponding vector of cross-correlations between the two innovation series. From this result, it follows that the test statistics considered are asymptotically distributed as chi-square random variables. Two test procedures are described. The first one is based on the residual cross-correlation matrix at a particular lag, whilst the second one is based on a portmanteau type statistic that generalizes Haugh's statistic. We also discuss how the procedures for testing noncorrelation can be adapted to determine the directions of causality in the sense of Granger (1969) between the two series. An advantage of the proposed procedures is that their application does not require the estimation of a global model for the two series. The finite-sample properties of the statistics introduced were studied by simulation under the null hypothesis. It led to modified statistics whose upper quantiles are much better approximated by those of the corresponding chi-square distribution. Finally, the procedures developed are applied to two different sets of economic data.     

New approximations to the exact distribution of the kruskal-wallis test statistic

Several approximations to the exact distribution of the Kruskal-Wallis test' statistic presently exist. There approximations can roughly be grouped into two classes: (i) computationally difficult with good accuracy, and (ii) easy to compute but not as accurate as the first class. The purpose of this paper is to introduce two nev approximations (one in the latter class and one which is computationally more involved)y and to compare these with other popular approximations. These comparisons use exact probabilities where available and Monte Carlo simulation otherwise.     

An Adjustment to the Bartlett's Test for Small Sample Size

The Bartlett's test (1937) for equality of variances is based on the χ² distribution approximation. This approximation deteriorates either when the sample size is small (particularly < 4) or when the population number is large. According to a simulation investigation, we find a similar varying trend for the mean differences between empirical distributions of Bartlett's statistics and their χ² approximations. By using the mean differences to represent the distribution departures, a simple adjustment approach on the Bartlett's statistic is proposed on the basis of equal mean principle. The performance before and after adjustment is extensively investigated under equal and unequal sample sizes, with number of populations varying from 3 to 100. Compared with the traditional Bartlett's statistic, the adjusted statistic is distributed more closely to χ² distribution, for homogeneity samples from normal populations. The type I error is well controlled and the power is a little higher after adjustment. In conclusion, the adjustment has good control on the type I error and higher power, and thus is recommended for small samples and large population number when underlying distribution is normal.     

A revision of the tukey multiple comparisons procedure to control the probability of committing at most one type i error

Halperin et al. (1988) suggested an approach which allows for k Type I errors while using Scheffe's method of multiple comparisons for linear combinations of p means. In this paper we apply the same type of error control to Tukey's method of multiple pairwise comparisons. In fact, the variant of the Tukey (1953) approach discussed here defines the error control objective as assuring with a specified probability that at most one out of the p(p-l)/2 comparisons between all pairs of the treatment means is significant in two-sided tests when an overall null hypothesis (all p means are equal) is true or, from a confidence interval point of view, that at most one of a set of simultaneous confidence intervals for all of the pairwise differences of the treatment means is incorrect. The formulae which yield the critical values needed to carry out this new procedure are derived and the critical values are tabulated. A Monte Carlo study was conducted and several tables are presented to demonstrate the experimentwise Type I error rates and the gains in power furnished by the proposed procedure     

A Bayesian test of independence in a two-way contingency table using surrogate sampling

We consider a Bayesian approach to the study of independence in a two-way contingency table which has been obtained from a two-stage cluster sampling design. If a procedure based on single-stage simple random sampling (rather than the appropriate cluster sampling) is used to test for independence, the p-value may be too small, resulting in a conclusion that the null hypothesis is false when it is, in fact, true. For many large complex surveys the Rao–Scott corrections to the standard chi-squared (or likelihood ratio) statistic provide appropriate inference. For smaller surveys, though, the Rao–Scott corrections may not be accurate, partly because the chi-squared test is inaccurate. In this paper, we use a hierarchical Bayesian model to convert the observed cluster samples to simple random samples. This provides surrogate samples which can be used to derive the distribution of the Bayes factor. We demonstrate the utility of our procedure using an example and also provide a simulation study which establishes our methodology as a viable alternative to the Rao–Scott approximations for relatively small two-stage cluster samples. We also show the additional insight gained by displaying the distribution of the Bayes factor rather than simply relying on a summary of the distribution.     

A Discussion of Permutation Tests Conditional to Observed Responses in Unreplicated 2 M Full Factorial Designs

ABSTRACT

In this article we present a new solution to test for effects in unreplicated two-level factorial designs. The proposed test statistic, in case the error components are normally distributed, follows an F random variable, though our attention is on its nonparametric permutation version. The proposed procedure does not require any transformation of data such as residualization and it is exact for each effect and distribution-free. Our main aim is to discuss a permutation solution conditional to the original vector of responses. We give two versions of the same nonparametric testing procedure in order to control both the individual error rate and the experiment-wise error rate. A power comparison with Loughin and Noble's test is provided in the case of a unreplicated 2⁴ full factorial design.