No Arabic abstract
Most of the consistency analyses of Bayesian procedures for variable selection in regression refer to pairwise consistency, that is, consistency of Bayes factors. However, variable selection in regression is carried out in a given class of regression models where a natural variable selector is the posterior probability of the models. In this paper we analyze the consistency of the posterior model probabilities when the number of potential regressors grows as the sample size grows. The novelty in the posterior model consistency is that it depends not only on the priors for the model parameters through the Bayes factor, but also on the model priors, so that it is a useful tool for choosing priors for both models and model parameters. We have found that some classes of priors typically used in variable selection yield posterior model inconsistency, while mixtures of these priors improve this undesirable behavior. For moderate sample sizes, we evaluate Bayesian pairwise variable selection procedures by comparing their frequentist Type I and II error probabilities. This provides valuable information to discriminate between the priors for the model parameters commonly used for variable selection.
In the class of normal regression models with a finite number of regressors, and for a wide class of prior distributions, a Bayesian model selection procedure based on the Bayes factor is consistent [Casella and Moreno J. Amer. Statist. Assoc. 104 (2009) 1261--1271]. However, in models where the number of parameters increases as the sample size increases, properties of the Bayes factor are not totally understood. Here we study consistency of the Bayes factors for nested normal linear models when the number of regressors increases with the sample size. We pay attention to two successful tools for model selection [Schwarz Ann. Statist. 6 (1978) 461--464] approximation to the Bayes factor, and the Bayes factor for intrinsic priors [Berger and Pericchi J. Amer. Statist. Assoc. 91 (1996) 109--122, Moreno, Bertolino and Racugno J. Amer. Statist. Assoc. 93 (1998) 1451--1460]. We find that the the Schwarz approximation and the Bayes factor for intrinsic priors are consistent when the rate of growth of the dimension of the bigger model is $O(n^b)$ for $b<1$. When $b=1$ the Schwarz approximation is always inconsistent under the alternative while the Bayes factor for intrinsic priors is consistent except for a small set of alternative models which is characterized.
Variable selection in high-dimensional space characterizes many contemporary problems in scientific discovery and decision making. Many frequently-used techniques are based on independence screening; examples include correlation ranking (Fan and Lv, 2008) or feature selection using a two-sample t-test in high-dimensional classification (Tibshirani et al., 2003). Within the context of the linear model, Fan and Lv (2008)showed that this simple correlation ranking possesses a sure independence screening property under certain conditions and that its revision, called iteratively sure independent screening (ISIS), is needed when the features are marginally unrelated but jointly related to the response variable. In this paper, we extend ISIS, without explicit definition of residuals, to a general pseudo-likelihood framework, which includes generalized linear models as a special case. Even in the least-squares setting, the new method improves ISIS by allowing variable deletion in the iterative process. Our technique allows us to select important features in high-dimensional classification where the popularly used two-sample t-method fails. A new technique is introduced to reduce the false discovery rate in the feature screening stage. Several simulated and two real data examples are presented to illustrate the methodology.
In the era of big data, variable selection is a key technology for handling high-dimensional problems with a small sample size but a large number of covariables. Different variable selection methods were proposed for different models, such as linear model, logistic model and generalized linear model. However, fewer works focused on variable selection for single index models, especially, for single index logistic model, due to the difficulty arose from the unknown link function and the slow mixing rate of MCMC algorithm for traditional logistic model. In this paper, we proposed a Bayesian variable selection procedure for single index logistic model by taking the advantage of Gaussian process and data augmentation. Numerical results from simulations and real data analysis show the advantage of our method over the state of arts.
Yang et al. (2016) proved that the symmetric random walk Metropolis--Hastings algorithm for Bayesian variable selection is rapidly mixing under mild high-dimensional assumptions. We propose a novel MCMC sampler using an informed proposal scheme, which we prove achieves a much faster mixing time that is independent of the number of covariates, under the same assumptions. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first high-dimensional result which rigorously shows that the mixing rate of informed MCMC methods can be fast enough to offset the computational cost of local posterior evaluation. Motivated by the theoretical analysis of our sampler, we further propose a new approach called two-stage drift condition to studying convergence rates of Markov chains on general state spaces, which can be useful for obtaining tight complexity bounds in high-dimensional settings. The practical advantages of our algorithm are illustrated by both simulation studies and real data analysis.
While there have been a lot of recent developments in the context of Bayesian model selection and variable selection for high dimensional linear models, there is not much work in the presence of change point in literature, unlike the frequentist counterpart. We consider a hierarchical Bayesian linear model where the active set of covariates that affects the observations through a mean model can vary between different time segments. Such structure may arise in social sciences/ economic sciences, such as sudden change of house price based on external economic factor, crime rate changes based on social and built-environment factors, and others. Using an appropriate adaptive prior, we outline the development of a hierarchical Bayesian methodology that can select the true change point as well as the true covariates, with high probability. We provide the first detailed theoretical analysis for posterior consistency with or without covariates, under suitable conditions. Gibbs sampling techniques provide an efficient computational strategy. We also consider small sample simulation study as well as application to crime forecasting applications.