No Arabic abstract
The usage of positive definite metric tensors derived from second derivative information in the context of the simplified manifold Metropolis adjusted Langevin algorithm (MALA) is explored. A new adaptive step length procedure that resolves the shortcomings of such metric tensors in regions where the log-target has near zero curvature in some direction is proposed. The adaptive step length selection also appears to alleviate the need for different tuning parameters in transient and stationary regimes that is typical of MALA. The combination of metric tensors derived from second derivative information and adaptive step length selection constitute a large step towards developing reliable manifold MCMC methods that can be implemented automatically for models with unknown or intractable Fisher information, and even for target distributions that do not admit factorization into prior and likelihood. Through examples of low to moderate dimension, it is shown that proposed methodology performs very well relative to alternative MCMC methods.
Modeling binary and categorical data is one of the most commonly encountered tasks of applied statisticians and econometricians. While Bayesian methods in this context have been available for decades now, they often require a high level of familiarity with Bayesian statistics or suffer from issues such as low sampling efficiency. To contribute to the accessibility of Bayesian models for binary and categorical data, we introduce novel latent variable representations based on Polya Gamma random variables for a range of commonly encountered discrete choice models. From these latent variable representations, new Gibbs sampling algorithms for binary, binomial and multinomial logistic regression models are derived. All models allow for a conditionally Gaussian likelihood representation, rendering extensions to more complex modeling frameworks such as state space models straight-forward. However, sampling efficiency may still be an issue in these data augmentation based estimation frameworks. To counteract this, MCMC boosting strategies are developed and discussed in detail. The merits of our approach are illustrated through extensive simulations and a real data application.
In this paper we perform Bayesian estimation of stochastic volatility models with heavy tail distributions using Metropolis adjusted Langevin (MALA) and Riemman manifold Langevin (MMALA) methods. We provide analytical expressions for the application of these methods, assess the performance of these methodologies in simulated data and illustrate their use on two financial time series data sets.
Bayesian inference for nonlinear diffusions, observed at discrete times, is a challenging task that has prompted the development of a number of algorithms, mainly within the computational statistics community. We propose a new direction, and accompanying methodology, borrowing ideas from statistical physics and computational chemistry, for inferring the posterior distribution of latent diffusion paths and model parameters, given observations of the process. Joint configurations of the underlying process noise and of parameters, mapping onto diffusion paths consistent with observations, form an implicitly defined manifold. Then, by making use of a constrained Hamiltonian Monte Carlo algorithm on the embedded manifold, we are able to perform computationally efficient inference for an extensive class of discretely observed diffusion models. Critically, in contrast with other approaches proposed in the literature, our methodology is highly automated, requiring minimal user intervention and applying alike in a range of settings, including: elliptic or hypo-elliptic systems; observations with or without noise; linear or non-linear observation operators. Exploiting Markovianity, we propose a variant of the method with complexity that scales linearly in the resolution of path discretisation and the number of observation times.
Riemann manifold Hamiltonian Monte Carlo (RMHMC) has the potential to produce high-quality Markov chain Monte Carlo-output even for very challenging target distributions. To this end, a symmetric positive definite scaling matrix for RMHMC, which derives, via a modified Cholesky factorization, from the potentially indefinite negative Hessian of the target log-density is proposed. The methodology is able to exploit the sparsity of the Hessian, stemming from conditional independence modeling assumptions, and thus admit fast implementation of RMHMC even for high-dimensional target distributions. Moreover, the methodology can exploit log-concave conditional target densities, often encountered in Bayesian hierarchical models, for faster sampling and more straight forward tuning. The proposed methodology is compared to alternatives for some challenging targets, and is illustrated by applying a state space model to real data.
In this tutorial we schematically illustrate four algorithms: (1) ABC rejection for parameter estimation (2) ABC SMC for parameter estimation (3) ABC rejection for model selection on the joint space (4) ABC SMC for model selection on the joint space.