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Register a new userConsistent distribution-free tests of association between univariate random variables
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Added by
Ruth Heller
Publication date
2013
fields
Mathematical Statistics
and research's language is
English
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We consider the problem of testing whether pairs of univariate random variables are associated. Few tests of independence exist that are consistent against all dependent alternatives and are distribution free. We propose novel tests that are consistent, distribution free, and have excellent power properties. The tests have simple form, and are surprisingly computationally efficient thanks to accompanying innovative algorithms we develop. Moreover, we show that one of the test statistics is a consistent estimator of the mutual information. We demonstrate the good power properties in simulations, and apply the tests to a microarray study where many pairs of genes are examined simultaneously for co-dependence.
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A popular approach for testing if two univariate random variables are statistically independent consists of partitioning the sample space into bins, and evaluating a test statistic on the binned data. The partition size matters, and the optimal partition size is data dependent. While for detecting simple relationships coarse partitions may be best, for detecting complex relationships a great gain in power can be achieved by considering finer partitions. We suggest novel consistent distribution-free tests that are based on summation or maximization aggregation of scores over all partitions of a fixed size. We show that our test statistics based on summation can serve as good estimators of the mutual information. Moreover, we suggest regularized tests that aggregate over all partition sizes, and prove those are consistent too. We provide polynomial-time algorithms, which are critical for computing the suggested test statistics efficiently. We show that the power of the regularized tests is excellent compared to existing tests, and almost as powerful as the tests based on the optimal (yet unknown in practice) partition size, in simulations as well as on a real data example.
For testing two random vectors for independence, we consider testing whether the distance of one vector from a center point is independent from the distance of the other vector from a center point by a univariate test. In this paper we provide conditions under which it is enough to have a consistent univariate test of independence on the distances to guarantee that the power to detect dependence between the random vectors increases to one, as the sample size increases. These conditions turn out to be minimal. If the univariate test is distribution-free, the multivariate test will also be distribution-free. If we consider multiple center points and aggregate the center-specific univariate tests, the power may be further improved, and the resulting multivariate test may be distribution-free for specific aggregation methods (if the univariate test is distribution-free). We show that several multivariate tests recently proposed in the literature can be viewed as instances of this general approach.
The analysis of record-breaking events is of interest in fields such as climatology, hydrology, economy or sports. In connection with the record occurrence, we propose three distribution-free statistics for the changepoint detection problem. They are CUSUM-type statistics based on the upper and/or lower record indicators which occur in a series. Using a version of the functional central limit theorem, we show that the CUSUM-type statistics are asymptotically Kolmogorov distributed. The main results under the null hypothesis are based on series of independent and identically distributed random variables, but a statistic to deal with series with seasonal component and serial correlation is also proposed. A Monte Carlo study of size, power and changepoint estimate has been performed. Finally, the methods are illustrated by analyzing the time series of temperatures at Madrid, Spain. The $textsf{R}$ package $texttt{RecordTest}$ publicly available on CRAN implements the proposed methods.
This paper investigates the problem of testing independence of two random vectors of general dimensions. For this, we give for the first time a distribution-free consistent test. Our approach combines distance covariance with the center-outward ranks and signs developed in Hallin (2017). In technical terms, the proposed test is consistent and distribution-free in the family of multivariate distributions with nonvanishing (Lebesgue) probability densities. Exploiting the (degenerate) U-statistic structure of the distance covariance and the combinatorial nature of Hallins center-outward ranks and signs, we are able to derive the limiting null distribution of our test statistic. The resulting asymptotic approximation is accurate already for moderate sample sizes and makes the test implementable without requiring permutation. The limiting distribution is derived via a more general result that gives a new type of combinatorial non-central limit theorem for double- and multiple-indexed permutation statistics.
Rank correlations have found many innovative applications in the last decade. In particular, suitable rank correlations have been used for consistent tests of independence between pairs of random variables. Using ranks is especially appealing for continuous data as tests become distribution-free. However, the traditional concept of ranks relies on ordering data and is, thus, tied to univariate observations. As a result, it has long remained unclear how one may construct distribution-free yet consistent tests of independence between random vectors. This is the problem addressed in this paper, in which we lay out a general framework for designing dependence measures that give tests of multivariate independence that are not only consistent and distribution-free but which we also prove to be statistically efficient. Our framework leverages the recently introduced concept of center-outward ranks and signs, a multivariate generalization of traditional ranks, and adopts a common standard form for dependence measures that encompasses many popular examples. In a unified study, we derive a general asymptotic representation of center-outward rank-based test statistics under independence, extending to the multivariate setting the classical H{a}jek asymptotic representation results. This representation permits direct calculation of limiting null distributions and facilitates a local power analysis that provides strong support for the center-outward approach by establishing, for the first time, the nontrivial power of center-outward rank-based tests over root-$n$ neighborhoods within the class of quadratic mean differentiable alternatives.
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