A NEW CLASS OF MODELS FOR THE DISCRIMINANT PROBLEM

Discriminant analysis is relevant to business decision making in a variety of contexts, such as when one decides to make or buy a specified component, fund a venture project, or hire a particular person. Potential applications in artificial intelligence, particularly in the area of pattern recognition, have further underscored the importance of the field. A recent innovation in discriminant analysis is provided by special linear programming (LP) models, which offer attractive alternatives to classical statistical approaches. The scope of application in which discriminant analysis can be advantageously employed is broadened by the flexibility to tailor parameters in the LP approaches to reflect diverse goals and by the power to explore the sensitivity of these parameters. In spite of the promise of the LP formulations, however, limitations to their effectiveness have been uncovered in certain settings. A recent advance involving a normalization construct removes some of the limitations but entails solving the LP model twice (to allow for different signs of a normalization constant) and does not yield equivalent solutions for different rotations of the problem data. This paper introduces a new model and a new class of normalizations that remedy both remaining limitations, making it possible to take advantage of the modeling capabilities of the LP formulations without the attendant shortcomings encountered by earlier investigations. Our development shows by empirical testing and illustrative analysis that the quality of solutions from LP discriminant approaches is more favorable (relative to the classical model) than previously supposed.     

A Variable Selection Criterion in the Linear Programming Approaches to Discriminant Analysis*

There are numerous variable selection rules in classical discriminant analysis. These rules enable a researcher to distinguish significant variables from nonsignificant ones and thus provide a parsimonious classification model based solely on significant variables. Prominent among such rules are the forward and backward stepwise variable selection criteria employed in statistical software packages such as Statistical Package for the Social Sciences and BMDP Statistical Software. No such criterion currently exists for linear programming (LP) approaches to discriminant analysis. In this paper, a criterion is developed to distinguish significant from nonsignificant variables for use in LP models. This criterion is based on the “jackknife” methodology. Examples are presented to illustrate implementation of the proposed criterion.     

西学东渐与中国近代女性道德观的演进

鸦片战争后,伴随着西学东渐的深入,近代西方女权思想、人权观念、婚姻理论等渐次传人中国,在近代中国社会引起共鸣。近代先进之士对比中西方女性道德文化,在对中国传统妇德的缺陷进行深刻反省和检讨的基础上,提出了近代意义上的新型女性道德观。这种新型女性道德观的形成与发展,集中地反映了近代先进知识分子对传统性别伦理道德反思的深度和广度,也清晰折射出西学东渐的日益加深。     

浅析“垮掉的一代”文学

"跨掉的一代"这场运动及其文学作家和作品对于国内部分青年读者来说可能还比较陌生.其原因是多方面的,但主要恐怕还是文学作品的中文译本太少.本文试图通过对这场运动及作家和作品产生的社会背景及其发展过程进行简单的介绍和分析,以便让国内青年读者对此有一个大致的了解.     

Lottomania and other anomalies in the market for lotto

This research is concerned with the determination of the demand for “lotto” in Israel. While an important focus of our research is upon the effects on the demand for lotto of ticket pricing and jackpot announcements, we also investigate several empirical phenomena that are apparently inconsistent with expected utility theory. These include an effect we call “lottomania” which is induced by rollover, and “prize fatigue” when the jackpot does not increase. Another aberration from expected utility theory is that the underlying odds of winning have no measurable effect on sales.     

“材料成形技术基础”课程教学改革探讨

介绍了"材料成形技术基础"课程的发展历程,系统分析了教学内容的优化途径,通过"教、学、研"一体化的教学理念,用实例说明围绕该教学理念开展教学工作设计的基本步骤;展示了全方位、多样化的教学手段,着重说明"与校外企业合作开展课程教学工作"和注重实践、课内外结合式教学手段的实现过程;最后对采用多层次考核方法提高学生的学习兴趣和学习效率进行了探讨。     

中央苏区调查统计工作的内容和成效 ——中央苏区调查统计工作的光辉实践与有益启示（二）

 中央苏区制发了众多的统计报表全面反映战争和建设情况，采取多种调查统计方法确保数据真实可靠，并利用丰富的调查统计资料积极开展统计分析，及时发布统计资料，为革命战争和苏区经济建设服务。     

Optimal Information Processing and Bayes's Theorem

In this article statistical inference is viewed as information processing involving input information and output information. After introducing information measures for the input and output information, an information criterion functional is formulated and optimized to obtain an optimal information processing rule (IPR). For the particular information measures and criterion functional adopted, it is shown that Bayes's theorem is the optimal IPR. This optimal IPR is shown to be 100% efficient in the sense that its use leads to the output information being exactly equal to the given input information. Also, the analysis links Bayes's theorem to maximum-entropy considerations.     

Bill Cochran: His Contributions to Medicine and Public Health and Some Personal Recollections

There is a tremendous need in our technological society to train statisticians for all sectors of education, government, and industry. Because statistical training has largely been restricted to graduate schools, the profession is losing many good students to other fields of study. Members of the statistics community are encouraged to reach out to high-school students and undergraduate students to increase the awareness of statistics as a scientific field of study and as a professional career. The ASA Council of Chapters has recently completed a slide presentation entitled “Statistical Science: The Profession,” which was professionally developed to aid this endeavor. In addition, high-school teachers, high-school counselors, and professors of mathematics and science education are identified as important audiences for hearing this message and for broadening general public awareness of what our profession has to offer.     

A Theory for Coloring Bivariate Statistical Maps

Consideration of some practical uses of statistical bivariate maps—for example, display of association between variables—leads to principles for making effective use of color to represent data values. Effective color schemes for bivariate maps are viewed as continuous transformations from color models to the unit square with appropriate restrictions involving hue, saturation, and brightness. Several schemes, including those used by the U.S. Census Bureau, are criticized on the basis of this theory.