Robust M-estimators of scale: Minimax bias versus maximal variance

In the location-scale estimation problem, we study robustness properties of M-estimators of the scale parameter under unknown ?-contamination of a fixed symmetric unimodal error distribution F₀. Within a general class of M-estimators, the estimator with minimax asymptotic bias is shown to lie within the subclass of α-interquantile ranges of the empirical distribution symmetrized about the sample median. Our main result is that as ? → 0, the limiting minimax asymptotic bias estimator is sometimes (e.g., when F_o is Cauchy), but not always, the median absolute deviation about the median. It is also shown that contamination in the neighbourhood of a discontinuity of the influence function of a minimax bias estimator can sometimes inflate the asymptotic variance beyond that achieved by placing all the ?-contamination at infinity. This effect is quantified by a new notion of asymptotic efficiency that takes into account the effect of infinitesimal contamination of the parametric model for the error distribution.     

Simultaneous robust estimation of location and scale parameters: A minimum-distance approach

Simultaneous robust estimates of location and scale parameters are derived from minimizing a minimum-distance criterion function. The criterion function measures the squared distance between the pth power (p > 0) of the empirical distribution function and the pth power of the imperfectly determined model distribution function over the real line. We show that the estimator is uniquely defined, is asymptotically bivariate normal and for p > 0.3 has positive breakdown. If the scale parameter is known, when p = 0.9 the asymptotic variance (1.0436) of the location estimator for the normal model is smaller than the asymptotic variance of the Hodges-Lehmann (HL)estimator (1.0472). Efficiencies with respect to HL and maximum-likelihood estimators (MLE) are 1.0034 and 0.9582, respectively. Similarly, if the location parameter is known, when p = 0.97 the asymptotic variance (0.6158) of the scale estimator is minimum. The efficiency with respect to the MLE is 0.8119. We show that the estimator can tolerate more corrupted observations at oo than at – for p < 1, and vice versa for p > 1.     

M-Estimates of regression when the scale is unknown and the error distribution is possibly asymmetric: A minimax result

Huber (1964) found the minimax-variance M-estimate of location under the assumption that the scale parameter is known; Li and Zamar (1991) extended this result to the case when the scale is unknown. We consider the robust estimation of the regression coefficients (β₁,…,β_p) when the scale and the intercept parameters are unknown. The minimax-variance estimates of (β₁,…,β_p) with respect to the trace of their asymptotic covariance matrix are derived. The maximum is taken over ?-contamination neighbourhoods of a central regression model with Gaussian errors (asymmetric contamination is allowed), and the minimum is taken over a large class of generalized M-estimates of regression of the Mallow type. The optimal choice of estimates for the nuisance parameters (scale and intercept) is also considered.     

Inference of stress-strength for the Type-II generalized logistic distribution under progressively Type-II censored samples

This article studies the estimation of the reliability R = P[Y < X] when X and Y come from two independent generalized logistic distributions of Type-II with different parameters, based on progressively Type-II censored samples. When the common scale parameter is unknown, the maximum likelihood estimator and its asymptotic distribution are proposed. The asymptotic distribution is used to construct an asymptotic confidence interval of R. Bayes estimator of R and the corresponding credible interval using the Gibbs sampling technique have been proposed too. Assuming that the common scale parameter is known, the maximum likelihood estimator, uniformly minimum variance unbiased estimator, Bayes estimation, and confidence interval of R are extracted. Monte Carlo simulations are performed to compare the different proposed methods. Analysis of a real dataset is given for illustrative purposes. Finally, methods are extended for proportional hazard rate models.     

On the robustness of empirical likelihood ratio confidence intervals for location

The authors examine the robustness of empirical likelihood ratio (ELR) confidence intervals for the mean and M‐estimate of location. They show that the ELR interval for the mean has an asymptotic breakdown point of zero. They also give a formula for computing the breakdown point of the ELR interval for M‐estimate. Through a numerical study, they further examine the relative advantages of the ELR interval to the commonly used confidence intervals based on the asymptotic distribution of the M‐estimate.     

Estimation of Pr( x<y ) in the exponential case with common location parameter

This paper considers the problem of estimating the probability P = Pr(X < Y) when X and Y are independent exponential random variables with unequal scale parameters and a common location parameter. Uniformly minimum variance unbiased estimator of P is obtained. The asymptotic distribution of the maximum likelihood estimator is obtained and then the asymptotic equivalence of the two estimators is established. Performance of the two estimators for moderate sample sizes is studied by Monte Carlo simulation. An approximate interval estimator is also obtained.     

Multivariate τ-estimators for location and scatter

We discuss the robustness and asymptotic behaviour of τ-estimators for multivariate location and scatter. We show that τ-estimators correspond to multivariate M-estimators defined by a weighted average of redescending ψ-functions, where the weights are adaptive. We prove consistency and asymptotic normality under weak assumptions on the underlying distribution, show that τ-estimators have a high breakdown point, and obtain the influence function at general distributions. In the special case of a location-scatter family, τ-estimators are asymptotically equivalent to multivariate S-estimators defined by means of a weighted ψ-function. This enables us to combine a high breakdown point and bounded influence with good asymptotic efficiency for the location and covariance estimator.     

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.     

Estimating with percentile grouped and truncated date from a scale parameter distribution

Data which is grouped and truncated is considered. We are given numbers n₁<…<n_k=n and we observe X_ni ),i=1,…k, and the tottal number of observations available (N> n_k is unknown. If the underlying distribution has one unknown parameter θ which enters as a scale parameter, we examine the form of the equations for both conditional, unconditional and modified maximum likelihood estimators of θ and N and examine when these estimators will be finite, and unique. We also develop expressions for asymptotic bias and search for modified estimators which minimize the maximum asymptotic bias. These results are specialized tG the zxponential distribution. Methods of computing the solutions to the likelihood equatims are also discussed.     

Inference of R=P[X<Y] for generalized logistic distribution

This paper deals with the estimation of R=P[X<Y] when X and Y come from two independent generalized logistic distributions with different parameters. The maximum-likelihood estimator (MLE) and its asymptotic distribution are proposed. The asymptotic distribution is used to construct an asymptotic confidence interval of R. Assuming that the common scale parameter is known, the MLE, uniformly minimum variance unbiased estimator, Bayes estimation and confidence interval of R are obtained. The MLE of R, asymptotic distribution of R in the general case, is also discussed. Monte Carlo simulations are performed to compare the different proposed methods. Analysis of a real data set has also been presented for illustrative purposes.     

Asymptotics for an Adaptive Trimmed Likelihood Location Estimator

An asymptotic normality result is given for an adaptive trimmed likelihood estimator of location, which parallels the asymptotic normality result for the adaptive trimmed mean. The new result comes out of studying the adaptive trimmed likelihood estimator modelled parametrically by a normal family but then examining the behavior when the underlying distribution is in fact some F different from normal. The asymptotic variance of the adaptive estimator is equal to the asymptotic variance of the trimmed likelihood estimator at the optimal trimming proportion for the distribution F, subject to that trimming proportion being positive and F being suitably smooth.     

Monitoring Change in Persistence Against the Null of Difference-Stationarity in Infinite Variance Observations

In this article, we propose a moving kernel-weighted variance ratio statistic to monitor persistence change in infinite variance observations. We focus on I(1) to I(0) persistence change for sequences in the domain of attraction of a stable law and local-to-finite variance sequences. The null distribution of the monitoring statistic and its consistency are proved. In particular, a bootstrap procedure is proposed to determine the critical values for the derived asymptotic distribution depends on unknown tail index. The small sample performances of proposed monitoring procedure are illustrated by both simulation and application to a high frequency financial data.     

Efficient bias-Robust M-Estimators of location in Kolmogorov normal neighbourhoods

We consider minimax-bias M-estimation of a location parameter in a Kolmogorov neighbourhood K() of a normal distribution. The maximum asymptotic bias of M-estimators for the Kolmogorov normal neighbourhood is derived, and its relation with the gross-error sensitivity of the estimator at the nominal model (the Gaussian case) is found. In addition, efficient bias-robust M-estimators T_i are constructed. Numerical results are also obtained to show the percentage of increase in maximum asymptotic bias and the efficiency we can achieve for some well-known -functions.     

Approximate MLEs for the location and scale parameters of the skew logistic distribution

Azzalini (Scand J Stat 12:171–178, 1985) provided a methodology to introduce skewness in a normal distribution. Using the same method of Azzalini (1985), the skew logistic distribution can be easily obtained by introducing skewness to the logistic distribution. For the skew logistic distribution, the likelihood equations do not provide explicit solutions for the location and scale parameters. We present a simple method of deriving explicit estimators by approximating the likelihood equations appropriately. We examine numerically the bias and variance of these estimators and show that these estimators are as efficient as the maximum likelihood estimators (MLEs). The coverage probabilities of the pivotal quantities (for location and scale parameters) based on asymptotic normality are shown to be unsatisfactory, especially when the effective sample size is small. To improve the coverage probabilities and for constructing confidence intervals, we suggest the use of simulated percentage points. Finally, we present a numerical example to illustrate the methods of inference developed here.     

Optimally robust estimators in generalized Pareto models

In this paper, we study the robustness properties of several procedures for the joint estimation of shape and scale in a generalized Pareto model. The estimators that we primarily focus upon, most bias robust estimator (MBRE) and optimal MSE-robust estimator (OMSE), are one-step estimators distinguished as optimally robust in the shrinking neighbourhood setting; that is, they minimize the maximal bias, respectively, on such a specific neighbourhood, the maximal mean squared error (MSE). For their initialization, we propose a particular location–dispersion estimator, MedkMAD, which matches the population median and kMAD (an asymmetric variant of the median of absolute deviations) against the empirical counterparts. These optimally robust estimators are compared to the maximum-likelihood, skipped maximum-likelihood, Cramér–von-Mises minimum distance, method-of-medians, and Pickands estimators. To quantify their deviation from robust optimality, for each of these suboptimal estimators, we determine the finite-sample breakdown point and the influence function, as well as the statistical accuracy measured by asymptotic bias, variance, and MSE – all evaluated uniformly on shrinking neighbourhoods. These asymptotic findings are complemented by an extensive simulation study to assess the finite-sample behaviour of the considered procedures. The applicability of the procedures and their stability against outliers are illustrated for the Danish fire insurance data set from the package evir.     

Comparison of efficient L- and R-estimators of location

Scholz (1974) proved that the asymptotic variance of an R-estimator of location is no larger than that of an L-estimator when the observations come from a distribution G different from the distribution F for which the two estimators are efficient. This note extends this result to distributions F whose density has a first but no second derivative.     

Inferences on Stress-Strength Reliability from Lindley Distributions

This article deals with the estimation of the stress-strength parameter R = P(Y < X) when X and Y are independent Lindley random variables with different shape parameters. The uniformly minimum variance unbiased estimator has explicit expression, however, its exact or asymptotic distribution is very difficult to obtain. The maximum likelihood estimator of the unknown parameter can also be obtained in explicit form. We obtain the asymptotic distribution of the maximum likelihood estimator and it can be used to construct confidence interval of R. Different parametric bootstrap confidence intervals are also proposed. Bayes estimator and the associated credible interval based on independent gamma priors on the unknown parameters are obtained using Monte Carlo methods. Different methods are compared using simulations and one data analysis has been performed for illustrative purposes.     

The influence function of penalized regression estimators

To perform regression analysis in high dimensions, lasso or ridge estimation are a common choice. However, it has been shown that these methods are not robust to outliers. Therefore, alternatives as penalized M-estimation or the sparse least trimmed squares (LTS) estimator have been proposed. The robustness of these regression methods can be measured with the influence function. It quantifies the effect of infinitesimal perturbations in the data. Furthermore, it can be used to compute the asymptotic variance and the mean-squared error (MSE). In this paper we compute the influence function, the asymptotic variance and the MSE for penalized M-estimators and the sparse LTS estimator. The asymptotic biasedness of the estimators make the calculations non-standard. We show that only M-estimators with a loss function with a bounded derivative are robust against regression outliers. In particular, the lasso has an unbounded influence function.     

On the LBI criterion for the multivariate one-way random effects model under non-normality

The asymptotic null distribution of the locally best invariant (LBI) test criterion for testing the random effect in the one-way multivariable analysis of variance model is derived under normality and non-normality. The error of the approximation is characterized as O(1/n). The non-null asymptotic distribution is also discussed. In addition to providing a way of obtaining percentage points and p-values, the results of this paper are useful in assessing the robustness of the LBI criterion. Numerical results are presented to illustrate the accuracy of the approximation.     

Residual variance estimation in moving average models

We consider time series models of the MA (moving average) family, and deal with the estimation of the residual variance. Results are known for maximum likelihood estimates under normality, both for known or unknown mean, in which case the asymptotic biases depend on the number of parameters (including the mean), and do not depend on the values of the parameters. For moment estimates the situation is different, because we find that the asymptotic biases depend on the values of the parameters, and become large as they approach the boundary of the region of invertibility. Our approach is to use Taylor series expansions, and the objective is to obtain asymptotic biases with error of o(l/T), where T is the sample size. Simulation results are presented, and corrections for bias suggested.