Obtaining a Trapezoidal Distribution

Given a most believed value for a quantity together with upper and lower possible deviations from that value, a rectangular distribution might be used to represent state-of-knowledge about the quantity. If the deviations are themselves known by probability distributions, and the value conditioned on the deviations is rectangular, then the marginal distribution of the value is determined by the distributions of the deviations. Here we show under quite general conditions that conversely, given the marginal distribution, the distributions of the deviations are uniquely determined. The case in which the marginal distribution is trapezoidal is studied in some detail.     

An Alpha Half Normal Slash Distribution for Analyzing Non Negative Data

In this paper, we study a new class of slash distribution. We define the distribution through means of a stochastic representation as the mixture of an alpha half normal random variable with respect to the power of a uniform random variable. Properties involving moments and moment generating function are derived. The usefulness and flexibility of the proposed distribution is illustrated through a real application by maximum likelihood procedure.     

Bias reduction for the maximum likelihood estimator of the doubly-truncated Poisson distribution

ABSTRACT

We derive an analytic expression for the bias of the maximum likelihood estimator of the parameter in a doubly-truncated Poisson distribution, which proves highly effective as a means of bias correction. For smaller sample sizes, our method outperforms the alternative of bias correction via the parametric bootstrap. Bias is of little concern in the positive Poisson distribution, the most common form of truncation in the applied literature. Bias appears to be the most severe in the doubly-truncated Poisson distribution, when the mean of the distribution is close to the right (upper) truncation.     

Gamma shared frailty model based on reversed hazard rate

Abstract

Frailty models are used in survival analysis to account for unobserved heterogeneity in individual risks to disease and death. To analyze bivariate data on related survival times (e.g., matched pairs experiments, twin, or family data), shared frailty models were suggested. Shared frailty models are frequently used to model heterogeneity in survival analysis. The most common shared frailty model is a model in which hazard function is a product of random factor(frailty) and baseline hazard function which is common to all individuals. There are certain assumptions about the baseline distribution and distribution of frailty. In this paper, we introduce shared gamma frailty models with reversed hazard rate. We introduce Bayesian estimation procedure using Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) technique to estimate the parameters involved in the model. We present a simulation study to compare the true values of the parameters with the estimated values. Also, we apply the proposed model to the Australian twin data set.     

Modeling bivariate survival data using shared inverse Gaussian frailty model

ABSTRACT

The shared frailty models are often used to model heterogeneity in survival analysis. The most common shared frailty model is a model in which hazard function is a product of a random factor (frailty) and the baseline hazard function which is common to all individuals. There are certain assumptions about the baseline distribution and the distribution of frailty. In this paper, we consider inverse Gaussian distribution as frailty distribution and three different baseline distributions, namely the generalized Rayleigh, the weighted exponential, and the extended Weibull distributions. With these three baseline distributions, we propose three different inverse Gaussian shared frailty models. We also compare these models with the models where the above-mentioned distributions are considered without frailty. We develop the Bayesian estimation procedure using Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) technique to estimate the parameters involved in these models. We present a simulation study to compare the true values of the parameters with the estimated values. A search of the literature suggests that currently no work has been done for these three baseline distributions with a shared inverse Gaussian frailty so far. We also apply these three models by using a real-life bivariate survival data set of McGilchrist and Aisbett (1991 McGilchrist, C.A., Aisbett, C.W. (1991). Regression with frailty in survival analysis. Biometrics 47:461–466.[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) related to the kidney infection data and a better model is suggested for the data using the Bayesian model selection criteria.     

The Poisson-conjugate Lindley mixture distribution

ABSTRACT

A new discrete distribution that depends on two parameters is introduced in this article. From this new distribution the geometric distribution is obtained as a special case. After analyzing some of its properties such as moments and unimodality, recurrences for the probability mass function and differential equations for its probability generating function are derived. In addition to this, parameters are estimated by maximum likelihood estimation numerically maximizing the log-likelihood function. Expected frequencies are calculated for different sets of data to prove the versatility of this discrete model.     

On the Bayes estimators of the parameters of size-biased generalized power series distributions

ABSTRACT

In this paper, we derive the Bayes estimators of functions of parameters of the size-biased generalized power series distribution under squared error loss function and weighted square error loss function. The results of size-biased GPSD are then used to obtain particular cases of the size-biased negative binomial, size-biased logarithmic series, and size-biased Poisson distributions. These estimators are better than the classical minimum variance unbiased estimators in the sense that they increase the range of the estimation. Finally, an example is provided to illustrate the results and a goodness of fit test is done using the maximum likelihood and Bayes estimators.     

Tail behavior of the generalized Maxwell distribution

Abstract

In this article, we investigate the tail propertiesof the generalized Maxwell distribution and gain an asymptoticbehavior of its Mills-type ratio. Meanwhile, we show two applications. The first application thinks about the asymptotic property of the ratio of density functions and the ratio of the tails of the generalized Maxwell and classical Maxwell distributions. Another application obtains the asymptotic distribution of the partial maximum of an independent and identically distributed sequence from the distribution.     

New estimators of distribution functions

ABSTRACT

This article considers the estimation of a distribution function F_X(x) based on a random sample X₁, X₂, …, X_n when the sample is suspected to come from a close-by distribution F₀(x). The new estimators, namely the preliminary test (PTE) and Stein-type estimator (SE) are defined and compared with the “empirical distribution function” (edf) under local departure. In this case, we show that Stein-type estimators are superior to edf and PTE is superior to edf when it is close to F₀(x). As a by-product similar estimators are proposed for population quantiles.