No Arabic abstract
A common concern with Bayesian methodology in scientific contexts is that inferences can be heavily influenced by subjective biases. As presented here, there are two types of bias for some quantity of interest: bias against and bias in favor. Based upon the principle of evidence, it is shown how to measure and control these biases for both hypothesis assessment and estimation problems. Optimality results are established for the principle of evidence as the basis of the approach to these problems. A close relationship is established between measuring bias in Bayesian inferences and frequentist properties that hold for any proper prior. This leads to a possible resolution to an apparent conflict between these approaches to statistical reasoning. Frequentism is seen as establishing a figure of merit for a statistical study, while Bayesianism plays the key role in determining inferences based upon statistical evidence.
Variable selection in the linear regression model takes many apparent faces from both frequentist and Bayesian standpoints. In this paper we introduce a variable selection method referred to as a rescaled spike and slab model. We study the importance of prior hierarchical specifications and draw connections to frequentist generalized ridge regression estimation. Specifically, we study the usefulness of continuous bimodal priors to model hypervariance parameters, and the effect scaling has on the posterior mean through its relationship to penalization. Several model selection strategies, some frequentist and some Bayesian in nature, are developed and studied theoretically. We demonstrate the importance of selective shrinkage for effective variable selection in terms of risk misclassification, and show this is achieved using the posterior from a rescaled spike and slab model. We also show how to verify a procedures ability to reduce model uncertainty in finite samples using a specialized forward selection strategy. Using this tool, we illustrate the effectiveness of rescaled spike and slab models in reducing model uncertainty.
For estimating a lower bounded location or mean parameter for a symmetric and logconcave density, we investigate the frequentist performance of the $100(1-alpha)%$ Bayesian HPD credible set associated with priors which are truncations of flat priors onto the restricted parameter space. Various new properties are obtained. Namely, we identify precisely where the minimum coverage is obtained and we show that this minimum coverage is bounded between $1-frac{3alpha}{2}$ and $1-frac{3alpha}{2}+frac{alpha^2}{1+alpha}$; with the lower bound $1-frac{3alpha}{2}$ improving (for $alpha leq 1/3$) on the previously established ([9]; [8]) lower bound $frac{1-alpha}{1+alpha}$. Several illustrative examples are given.
We investigate the frequentist coverage properties of Bayesian credible sets in a general, adaptive, nonparametric framework. It is well known that the construction of adaptive and honest confidence sets is not possible in general. To overcome this problem we introduce an extra assumption on the functional parameters, the so called general polished tail condition. We then show that under standard assumptions both the hierarchical and empirical Bayes methods results in honest confidence sets for sieve type of priors in general settings and we characterize their size. We apply the derived abstract results to various examples, including the nonparametric regression model, density estimation using exponential families of priors, density estimation using histogram priors and nonparametric classification model, for which we show that their size is near minimax adaptive with respect to the considered specific semi-metrics.
The features of a logically sound approach to a theory of statistical reasoning are discussed. A particular approach that satisfies these criteria is reviewed. This is seen to involve selection of a model, model checking, elicitation of a prior, checking the prior for bias, checking for prior-data conflict and estimation and hypothesis assessment inferences based on a measure of evidence. A long-standing anomalous example is resolved by this approach to inference and an application is made to a practical problem of considerable importance which, among other novel aspects of the analysis, involves the development of a relevant elicitation algorithm.
This paper deals with measuring the Bayesian robustness of classes of contaminated priors. Two different classes of priors in the neighborhood of the elicited prior are considered. The first one is the well-known $epsilon$-contaminated class, while the second one is the geometric mixing class. The proposed measure of robustness is based on computing the curvature of Renyi divergence between posterior distributions. Examples are used to illustrate the results by using simulated and real data sets.