Search results for " Probability"
showing 10 items of 2176 documents
Estimation of causal effects with small data in the presence of trapdoor variables
2021
We consider the problem of estimating causal effects of interventions from observational data when well-known back-door and front-door adjustments are not applicable. We show that when an identifiable causal effect is subject to an implicit functional constraint that is not deducible from conditional independence relations, the estimator of the causal effect can exhibit bias in small samples. This bias is related to variables that we call trapdoor variables. We use simulated data to study different strategies to account for trapdoor variables and suggest how the related trapdoor bias might be minimized. The importance of trapdoor variables in causal effect estimation is illustrated with rea…
Bayesian inference for the extremal dependence
2016
A simple approach for modeling multivariate extremes is to consider the vector of component-wise maxima and their max-stable distributions. The extremal dependence can be inferred by estimating the angular measure or, alternatively, the Pickands dependence function. We propose a nonparametric Bayesian model that allows, in the bivariate case, the simultaneous estimation of both functional representations through the use of polynomials in the Bernstein form. The constraints required to provide a valid extremal dependence are addressed in a straightforward manner, by placing a prior on the coefficients of the Bernstein polynomials which gives probability one to the set of valid functions. The…
Grapham: Graphical models with adaptive random walk Metropolis algorithms
2008
Recently developed adaptive Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods have been applied successfully to many problems in Bayesian statistics. Grapham is a new open source implementation covering several such methods, with emphasis on graphical models for directed acyclic graphs. The implemented algorithms include the seminal Adaptive Metropolis algorithm adjusting the proposal covariance according to the history of the chain and a Metropolis algorithm adjusting the proposal scale based on the observed acceptance probability. Different variants of the algorithms allow one, for example, to use these two algorithms together, employ delayed rejection and adjust several parameters of the algorithm…
Thresholding projection estimators in functional linear models
2008
We consider the problem of estimating the regression function in functional linear regression models by proposing a new type of projection estimators which combine dimension reduction and thresholding. The introduction of a threshold rule allows to get consistency under broad assumptions as well as minimax rates of convergence under additional regularity hypotheses. We also consider the particular case of Sobolev spaces generated by the trigonometric basis which permits to get easily mean squared error of prediction as well as estimators of the derivatives of the regression function. We prove these estimators are minimax and rates of convergence are given for some particular cases.
Isotonic regression for metallic microstructure data: estimation and testing under order restrictions
2021
Investigating the main determinants of the mechanical performance of metals is not a simple task. Already known physical inspired qualitative relations between 2D microstructure characteristics and 3D mechanical properties can act as the starting point of the investigation. Isotonic regression allows to take into account ordering relations and leads to more efficient and accurate results when the underlying assumptions actually hold. The main goal in this paper is to test order relations in a model inspired by a materials science application. The statistical estimation procedure is described considering three different scenarios according to the knowledge of the variances: known variance ra…
Bayesian Checking of the Second Levels of Hierarchical Models
2007
Hierarchical models are increasingly used in many applications. Along with this increased use comes a desire to investigate whether the model is compatible with the observed data. Bayesian methods are well suited to eliminate the many (nuisance) parameters in these complicated models; in this paper we investigate Bayesian methods for model checking. Since we contemplate model checking as a preliminary, exploratory analysis, we concentrate on objective Bayesian methods in which careful specification of an informative prior distribution is avoided. Numerous examples are given and different proposals are investigated and critically compared.
Bootstrap validation of links of a minimum spanning tree
2018
We describe two different bootstrap methods applied to the detection of a minimum spanning tree obtained from a set of multivariate variables. We show that two different bootstrap procedures provide partly distinct information that can be highly informative about the investigated complex system. Our case study, based on the investigation of daily returns of a portfolio of stocks traded in the US equity markets, shows the degree of robustness and completeness of the information extracted with popular information filtering methods such as the minimum spanning tree and the planar maximally filtered graph. The first method performs a "row bootstrap" whereas the second method performs a "pair bo…
Panel Data Analysis via Mechanistic Models
2018
Panel data, also known as longitudinal data, consist of a collection of time series. Each time series, which could itself be multivariate, comprises a sequence of measurements taken on a distinct unit. Mechanistic modeling involves writing down scientifically motivated equations describing the collection of dynamic systems giving rise to the observations on each unit. A defining characteristic of panel systems is that the dynamic interaction between units should be negligible. Panel models therefore consist of a collection of independent stochastic processes, generally linked through shared parameters while also having unit-specific parameters. To give the scientist flexibility in model spe…
Mixture Hidden Markov Models for Sequence Data: The seqHMM Package in R
2019
Sequence analysis is being more and more widely used for the analysis of social sequences and other multivariate categorical time series data. However, it is often complex to describe, visualize, and compare large sequence data, especially when there are multiple parallel sequences per subject. Hidden (latent) Markov models (HMMs) are able to detect underlying latent structures and they can be used in various longitudinal settings: to account for measurement error, to detect unobservable states, or to compress information across several types of observations. Extending to mixture hidden Markov models (MHMMs) allows clustering data into homogeneous subsets, with or without external covariate…
Nowcasting COVID‐19 incidence indicators during the Italian first outbreak
2020
A novel parametric regression model is proposed to fit incidence data typically collected during epidemics. The proposal is motivated by real-time monitoring and short-term forecasting of the main epidemiological indicators within the first outbreak of COVID-19 in Italy. Accurate short-term predictions, including the potential effect of exogenous or external variables are provided. This ensures to accurately predict important characteristics of the epidemic (e.g., peak time and height), allowing for a better allocation of health resources over time. Parameter estimation is carried out in a maximum likelihood framework. All computational details required to reproduce the approach and replica…