Generalization of the robust bivariate t2 statistic to multivariate populations

The robust bivariate Hotelling–type T² statistics proposed by Tiku and Balakrishnan (1988) is extendend to p–variate (p ≧ 3) populations.     

On the computation of a robusl version of the optimal c(α) test

A robust test of a parameter while in the presence of nuisance parameters was proposed by Wang (1981). The test procedure is a robust extension of the optimal C(α) tests. A numerical method for computing the solution of the orthogonality condition that is required by the test procedure is provided. An example on the testing of normal scale while in the presence of outliers is worked out to illustrate the construction of the robust test.     

The robust economic statistical design of the Hotelling's T2 chart

ABSTRACT

Economic statistical designs aim at minimizing the cost of process monitoring when a specific scenario or a set of estimated process and cost parameters is given. But, in practice the process may be affected by more than one scenario which may lead to severe cost penalties if the wrong design is used. Here, we investigate the robust economic statistical design (RESD) of the T² chart in an attempt to reduce these cost penalties when there are multiple scenarios. Our method is to employ the genetic algorithm (GA) optimization method to minimize the total expected monitoring cost across all distinct scenarios. We illustrate the effectiveness of the method using two numerical examples. Simulation studies indicate that robust economic statistical designs should be encouraged in practice.     

Testing the information matrix equality with robust estimators

The information matrix (IM) equality can be used to test for misspecification of a parametric model. We study the behavior of the IM test when the maximum-likelihood (ML) estimators used in the construction of this test are replaced with robust estimators. The latter do not suffer from the masking effect in the presence of outliers and can improve the power of the IM test. At the normal location-scale model, the IM test using the ML estimators is known as the Jarque–Bera test, and uses skewness and kurtosis to detect deviations from normality. When robust estimators are employed to test the IM equality, a robust version of the Jarque–Bera test emerges. We investigate in detail the local asymptotic power of the IM test, for various estimators and under a variety of local alternatives. For the normal regression model, it is shown by simulations under fixed alternatives that in many cases the use of robust estimators substantially increases the power of the IM test.     

New robust estimators for detecting non-random patterns in multivariate control charts: a simulation approach

In the past decade, different robust estimators have been proposed by several researchers to improve the ability to detect non-random patterns such as trend, process mean shift, and outliers in multivariate control charts. However, the use of the sample mean vector and the mean square successive difference matrix in the T ² control chart is sensitive in detecting process mean shift or trend but less sensitive in detecting outliers. On the other hand, the minimum volume ellipsoid (MVE) estimators in the T ² control chart are sensitive in detecting multiple outliers but less sensitive in detecting trend or process mean shift. Therefore, new robust estimators using both merits of the mean square successive difference matrix and the MVE estimators are developed to modify Hotelling's T ² control chart. To compare the detection performance among various control charts, a simulation approach for establishing control limits and calculating signal probabilities is provided as well. Our simulation results show that a multivariate control chart using the new robust estimators can achieve a well-balanced sensitivity in detecting the above-mentioned non-random patterns. Finally, three numerical examples further demonstrate the usefulness of our new robust estimators.     

Robust statistics for testing mean vectors of multivariate distributions

We develop a ‘robust’ statistic T² _R, based on Tiku's (1967, 1980) MML (modified maximum likelihood) estimators of location and scale parameters, for testing an assumed meam vector of a symmetric multivariate distribution. We show that T² _R is one the whole considerably more powerful than the prominenet Hotelling T² statistics. We also develop a robust statistic T² _D for testing that two multivariate distributions (skew or symmetric) are identical; T² _D seems to be usually more powerful than nonparametric statistics. The only assumption we make is that the marginal distributions are of the type (1/σ_k)f((x-μ_k)/σ_k) and the means and variances of these marginal distributions exist.     

A comparison study of effectiveness and robustness of robust economic designs of T2 chart using genetic algorithm

ABSTRACT

Recently, researchers have tried to design the T² chart economically to achieve the minimum possible quality cost; however, when T² chart is designed, it is important to consider multiple scenarios. This research presents the robust economic designs of the T² chart where there is more than one scenario. An illustrative example is used to demonstrate the effect of the model parameters on the optimal designs. The genetic algorithm optimization method is employed to obtain the optimal designs. Simulation studies show that the robust economic designs of T² chart are more effective than traditional economic design in practice.     

Robust slippage rank tests for k location parameters in the presence of gross errors

A robust slippage test problem of k location parameters in the presence of gross errors is formulated from the point of view of Huber's robust test theory. Under an asymptotic model of the robust slippage test problem an asymptotic level α slippage rank test based on k linear rank statistics is constructed by applying majorization methods and its asymptotic minimum power is evaluated by applying weak majorization methods. It is also shown that the slippage rank test is asymptotically unbiased.     

Estimators of the multiple correlation coefficient: Local robustness and confidence intervals

Many robust regression estimators are defined by minimizing a measure of spread of the residuals. An accompanying R ²-measure, or multiple correlation coefficient, is then easily obtained. In this paper, local robustness properties of these robust R ²-coefficients are investigated. It is also shown how confidence intervals for the population multiple correlation coefficient can be constructed in the case of multivariate normality.     

Simultaneous estimation of number of signals and signal parameters of superimposed sinusoidal model: A robust sequential bivariate M-periodogram approach

Accurate estimation of the parameters of superimposed sinusoidal signals is an important problem in digital signal processing and time series analysis. In this article, we propose a simultaneous estimation procedure for estimation of the number of signals and signal parameters. The proposed sequential method is based on a robust bivariate M-periodogram and uses the orthogonal structure of the superimposed sinusoidal model for sequential estimation. Extensive simulations and data analysis show that the proposed method has a high degree of frequency resolution capability and can provide robust and efficient estimates of the number of signals and signal parameters.     

Limitations of the rank transform statistic in tests for interactions

Conover and Iman (1976), Iman (1974), and Iman and Conover (1976) have found the rank transform test to be robust and powerful when testing for interaction in experimental designs.The current study shows that, insofar as tests for interactions

are concerned, the rank transform test is robust and powerful in some circumstances but is dramatically nonrobust and manifests power significantly below that of the usual F test in some cases. Therefore, this procedure should be used only withcaution when employed in designs suchas those examined here.     

A robust test for the homogeneity of scales

Many robust tests for the equality of variances have been proposed recently. Brown and Forsythe (1974) and Layard (1973) review some of the well-known procedures and compare them by simulation methods. Brown and Forsythe’s alternative formulation of Levene’s test statistic is found to be quite robust under certain nonnormal distributions. The performance of the methods, however, suffers in the presence of heavy tailed distributions such as the Cauchy distribution.

In this paper, we propose and study a simple robust test. The results obtained from the Monte Carlo study compare favorably with those of the existing procedures.     

Simple Robust Tests for Autocorrelated Errors in Time Series Design Intervention Models

A simple, robust test for the autocorrelation parameter in an intervention time-series model (AB design) is proposed. It is analogous to the traditional tests and can easily be computed by using the freeware R. In the same way as traditional tests of autocorrelation are based on least squares (LS) fits of a linear model, our robust test is based on the highly efficient Wilcoxon fit of the linear model. We present the results of a Monte Carlo study which show that our robust test inherits the good efficiency properties of this Wilcoxon fit. Its empirical power is only slightly less than the empirical power of the least squares test over situations with normally distributed errors while it exhibited much more power over situations with error distributions having tails heavier than those of a normal distribution. It also showed robustness of validity over all null situations simulated. We also present the results of the application of our test to a real data set which illustrates the robustness of our test.     

The finite-sample performance of robust unit root tests

This paper investigates the relative small sample performance of several robust unit root tests by means of a simulation study. It is confirmed that the traditional least-squares based Dickey-Fuller test has substantially lower power than several robust alternatives if the error distribution is fat-tailed while its power gain is small at the normal model. Particularly good results are achieved by a quasi-maximum likelihood test. However, all robust tests under consideration exhibit severe size distortions if the disturbances follow a skewed distribution. Moreover, under additive outliers, robust tests fail to produce stable sizes and good power properties. Consequently, the value of using robust unit root tests depends heavily of the type of nonnormality at hand.     

Critical Values for the Robust Rank-Order Test

ABSTRACT

The nonparametric Wilcoxon–Mann–Whitney test is commonly used by practitioners for detecting differences in location (mean, median) between two samples. Earlier work has shown this test to have a number of disadvantages, most of which are remedied by use of the alternative robust rank-order test. Use of the robust rank-order test has been limited, perhaps partly because exact critical values have up to now been available for only a small number of sample-size values, and not for all of the commonly used levels of significance. This article expands what is known about the distribution of the robust rank-order test statistic; critical values are given for more sample sizes and for more levels of significance.     

Some Statistical Properties of Efficiency Robust Tests with Applications to Genetic Association Studies

Although efficiency robust tests are preferred for genetic association studies when the genetic model is unknown, their statistical properties have been studied for different study designs separately under special situations. We study some statistical properties of the maximin efficiency robust test and a maximum‐type robust test (MAX3) under a general setting and obtain unified results. The results can also be applied to testing hypothesis with a constrained two‐dimensional parameter space. The results are applied to genetic association studies using case–parents trio data.     

A Robust Test for Non-nested Hypotheses

We propose a robust version of Cox-type test statistics for the choice between two non-nested hypotheses. We first show that the influence of small amounts of contamination in the data on the test decision can be very large. Secondly, we build a robust test statistic by using the results on robust parametric tests that are available in the literature and show that the level of the robust test is stable. Finally, we show numerically not only the robustness of this new test statistic but also that its asymptotic distribution is a good approximation of its sample distribution, unlike for the classical test statistic. We apply our results to the choice between a Pareto and an exponential distribution as well as between two competing regressors in the simple linear regression model without intercept.     

A class of robust stepwise alternatives to Hotelling's T 2 tests

Hotelling's T 2 test is known to be optimal under multivariate normality and is reasonably validity-robust when the assumption fails. However, some recently introduced robust test procedures have superior power properties and reasonable type I error control with non-normal populations. These, including the tests due to Tiku & Singh (1982), Tiku & Balakrishnan (1988) and Mudholkar & Srivastava (1999b, c), are asymptotically valid but are useful with moderate size samples only if the population dimension is small. A class of B-optimal modifications of the stepwise alternatives to Hotellings T 2 introduced by Mudholkar & Subbaiah (1980) are simple to implement and essentially equivalent to the T 2 test even with small samples. In this paper we construct and study the robust versions of these modified stepwise tests using trimmed means instead of sample means. We use the robust one- and two-sample trimmed- t procedures as in Mudholkar et al. (1991) and propose statistics based on combining them. The results of an extensive Monte Carlo experiment show that the robust alternatives provide excellent type I error control and a substantial gain in power.     

Maximum Test versus Adaptive Tests for the Two-Sample Location Problem

For the non-parametric two-sample location problem, adaptive tests based on a selector statistic are compared with a maximum and a sum test, respectively. When the class of all continuous distributions is not restricted, the sum test is not a robust test, i.e. it does not have a relatively high power across the different possible distributions. However, according to our simulation results, the adaptive tests as well as the maximum test are robust. For a small sample size, the maximum test is preferable, whereas for a large sample size the comparison between the adaptive tests and the maximum test does not show a clear winner. Consequently, one may argue in favour of the maximum test since it is a useful test for all sample sizes. Furthermore, it does not need a selector and the specification of which test is to be performed for which values of the selector. When the family of possible distributions is restricted, the maximin efficiency robust test may be a further robust alternative. However, for the family of t distributions this test is not as powerful as the corresponding maximum test.     

Comparison of normal variance estimators under multiple criteria and towards a compromise estimator

For estimating a normal variance under the squared error loss function it is well known that the best affine (location and scale) equivariant estimator, which is better than the maximum likelihood estimator as well as the unbiased estimator, is also inadmissible. The improved estimators, e.g., stein type, brown type and Brewster–Zidek type, are all scale equivariant but not location invariant. Lately, a good amount of research has been done to compare the improved estimators in terms of risk, but comparatively less attention had been paid to compare these estimators in terms of the Pitman nearness criterion (PNC) as well as the stochastic domination criterion (SDC). In this paper, we have undertaken a comprehensive study to compare various variance estimators in terms of the PNC and the SDC, which has been long overdue. Finally, using the results for risk, the PNC and the SDC, we propose a compromise estimator (sort of a robust estimator) which appears to work ‘well’ under all the criteria discussed above.