This study develops a non-asymptotic Gaussian approximation theory for distributions of M-estimators, which are defined as maximizers of empirical criterion functions. In existing mathematical statistics literature, numerous studies have focused on approximating the distributions of the M-estimators for statistical inference. In contrast to the existing approaches, which mainly focus on limiting behaviors, this study employs a non-asymptotic approach, establishes abstract Gaussian approximation results for maximizers of empirical criteria, and proposes a Gaussian multiplier bootstrap approximation method. Our developments can be considered as extensions of the seminal works (Chernozhukov, Chetverikov and Kato (2013, 2014, 2015)) on the approximation theory for distributions of suprema of empirical processes toward their maximizers. Through this work, we shed new lights on the statistical theory of M-estimators. Our theory covers not only regular estimators, such as the least absolute deviations, but also some non-regular cases where it is difficult to derive or to approximate numerically the limiting distributions such as non-Donsker classes and cube root estimators.
For the problem of nonparametric estimation of signal in Gaussian noise we point out the strong asymptotically minimax estimators on maxisets for linear estimators (see \cite{ker93,rio}). It turns out that the order of rates of convergence of Pinsker estimator on this maxisets is worse than the order of rates of convergence for the class of linear estimators considered on this maxisets. We show that balls in Sobolev spaces are maxisets for Pinsker estimators.
In this paper, we consider an inference problem for the first order autoregressive process driven by a long memory stationary Gaussian process. Suppose that the covariance function of the noise can be expressed as $\abs{k}^{2H-2}$ times a function slowly varying at infinity. The fractional Gaussian noise and the fractional ARIMA model and some others Gaussian noise are special examples that satisfy this assumption. We propose a second moment estimator and prove the strong consistency and give the asymptotic distribution. Moreover, when the limit distribution is Gaussian, we give the upper Berr…
We make use of the empirical process theory to approximate the adapted Hill estimator, for censored data, in terms of Gaussian processes. Then, we derive its asymptotic normality, only under the usual second-order condition of regular variation. Our methodology allows to relax the assumptions, made in Einmahl, Fils-Villetard and Guillou(2008), on the heavy-tailed distribution functions and the sample fraction of upper order statistics.
In this paper, we consider an inference problem for the first order autoregressive process with non-zero mean driven by a long memory stationary Gaussian process. Suppose that the covariance function of the noise can be expressed as $|k|^{2H-2}$ times a positive constant when $k$ tends to infinity, and the fractional Gaussian noise and the fractional ARIMA model are special examples that satisfy this assumption. We propose moment estimators and prove the strong consistency, the asymptotic normality and joint asymptotic normality.
Zhang (2019) presented a general estimation approach based on the Gaussian distribution for general parametric models where the likelihood of the data is difficult to obtain or unknown, but the mean and variance-covariance matrix are known. Castilla and Zografos (2021) extended the method to density power divergence-based estimators, which are more robust than the likelihood-based Gaussian estimator against data contamination. In this paper we introduce the restricted minimum density power divergence Gaussian estimator (MDPDGE) and study its main asymptotic properties. Also, we examine it robu…
A new nonparametric estimator of the local Hurst function of a multifractional Gaussian process based on the increment ratio (IR) statistic is defined. In a general frame, the point-wise and uniform weak and strong consistency and a multidimensional central limit theorem for this estimator are established. Similar results are obtained for a refinement of the generalized quadratic variations (QV) estimator. The example of the multifractional Brownian motion is studied in detail. A simulation study is included showing that the IR-estimator is more accurate than the QV-estimator.
Stochastic simulators such as Monte-Carlo estimators are widely used in science and engineering to study physical systems through their probabilistic representation. Global sensitivity analysis aims to identify the input parameters which have the most important impact on the output. A popular tool to perform global sensitivity analysis is the variance-based method which comes from the Hoeffding-Sobol decomposition. Nevertheless, this method requires an important number of simulations and is often unfeasible under reasonable time constraint. Therefore, an approximation of the input/output relat…
In this paper, we study robust estimators of the memory parameter d of a (possibly) non stationary Gaussian time series with generalized spectral density f. This generalized spectral density is characterized by the memory parameter d and by a function f* which specifies the short-range dependence structure of the process. Our setting is semi-parametric since both f* and d are unknown and d is the only parameter of interest. The memory parameter d is estimated by regressing the logarithm of the estimated variance of the wavelet coefficients at different scales. The two estimators of d that we c…
This paper deals with the maximum likelihood estimator for the mean-reverting parameter of a first order autoregressive models with exogenous variables, which are stationary Gaussian noises (Colored noise). Using the method of the Laplace transform, both the asymptotic properties and the asymptotic design problem of the maximum likelihood estimator are investigated. The numerical simulation results confirm the theoretical analysis and show that the proposed maximum likelihood estimator performs well in finite sample.
In many families of distributions, maximum likelihood estimation is intractable because the normalization constant for the density which enters into the likelihood function is not easily available. The score matching estimator of Hyvärinen (2005) provides an alternative where this normalization constant is not required. The corresponding estimating equations become linear for an exponential family. The score matching estimator is shown to be consistent and asymptotically normally distributed for such models, although not necessarily efficient. Gaussian linear concentration models are examples …
We study the Nonparametric Maximum Likelihood Estimator (NPMLE) for estimating Gaussian location mixture densities in $d$-dimensions from independent observations. Unlike usual likelihood-based methods for fitting mixtures, NPMLEs are based on convex optimization. We prove finite sample results on the Hellinger accuracy of every NPMLE. Our results imply, in particular, that every NPMLE achieves near parametric risk (up to logarithmic multiplicative factors) when the true density is a discrete Gaussian mixture without any prior information on the number of mixture components. NPMLEs can natural…
In this paper we prove large and moderate deviations principles for the recursive kernel estimators of a probability density function defined by the stochastic approximation algorithm introduced by Mokkadem et al. [2009. The stochastic approximation method for the estimation of a probability density. J. Statist. Plann. Inference 139, 2459-2478]. We show that the estimator constructed using the stepsize which minimize the variance of the class of the recursive estimators defined in Mokkadem et al. (2009) gives the same pointwise LDP and MDP as the Rosenblatt kernel estimator. We provide results…
We apply the stochastic approximation method to construct a large class of recursive kernel estimators of a probability density, including the one introduced by Hall and Patil (1994). We study the properties of these estimators and compare them with Rosenblatt's nonrecursive estimator. It turns out that, for pointwise estimation, it is preferable to use the nonrecursive Rosenblatt's kernel estimator rather than any recursive estimator. A contrario, for estimation by confidence intervals, it is better to use a recursive estimator rather than Rosenblatt's estimator.
We address estimation of parametric coefficients of a pure-jump Lévy driven univariate stochastic differential equation (SDE) model, which is observed at high frequency over a fixed time period. It is known from the previous study Masuda (2013) that adopting the conventional Gaussian quasi-maximum likelihood estimator then leads to an inconsistent estimator. In this paper, under the assumption that the driving Lévy process is locally stable, we extend the Gaussian framework into a non-Gaussian counterpart, by introducing a novel quasi-likelihood function formally based on the small-time stable…
The goal of this paper is to show that a single robust estimator of the mean of a multivariate Gaussian distribution can enjoy five desirable properties. First, it is computationally tractable in the sense that it can be computed in a time which is at most polynomial in dimension, sample size and the logarithm of the inverse of the contamination rate. Second, it is equivariant by translations, uniform scaling and orthogonal transformations. Third, it has a high breakdown point equal to $0.5$, and a nearly-minimax-rate-breakdown point approximately equal to $0.28$. Fourth, it is minimax rate op…
In this paper we consider the kernel estimators of a distribution function defined by the stochastic approximation algorithm when the observation are contamined by measurement errors. It is well known that this estimators depends heavily on the choice of a smoothing parameter called the bandwidth. We propose a specific second generation plug-in method of the deconvolution kernel distribution estimators defined by the stochastic approximation algorithm. We show that, using the proposed bandwidth selection and the stepsize which minimize the MISE (Mean Integrated Squared Error), the proposed est…
This paper is first devoted to study an adaptive wavelet based estimator of the long memory parameter for linear processes in a general semi-parametric frame. This is an extension of Bardet {\it et al.} (2008) which only concerned Gaussian processes. Moreover, the definition of the long memory parameter estimator is modified and asymptotic results are improved even in the Gaussian case. Finally an adaptive goodness-of-fit test is also built and easy to be employed: it is a chi-square type test. Simulations confirm the interesting properties of consistency and robustness of the adaptive estimat…
The asymptotic normality of the Maximum Likelihood Estimator (MLE) is a long established result. Explicit bounds for the distributional distance between the distribution of the MLE and the normal distribution have recently been obtained for the case of independent random variables. In this paper, a local dependence structure is introduced between the random variables and we give upper bounds which are specified for the Wasserstein metric.
We consider the class of all stationary Gaussian process with explicit parametric spectral density. Under some conditions on the autocovariance function, we defined a GMM estimator that satisfies consistency and asymptotic normality, using the Breuer-Major theorem and previous results on ergodicity. This result is applied to the joint estimation of the three parameters of a stationary Ornstein-Uhlenbeck (fOU) process driven by a fractional Brownian motion. The asymptotic normality of its GMM estimator applies for any H in (0,1) and under some restrictions on the remaining parameters. A numeric…
The asymptotic normality of the maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) under regularity conditions is a cornerstone of statistical theory. In this paper, we give explicit upper bounds on the distributional distance between the distribution of the MLE of a vector parameter, and the multivariate normal distribution. We work with possibly high-dimensional, independent but not necessarily identically distributed random vectors. In addition, we obtain explicit upper bounds even in cases where the MLE cannot be expressed analytically.
In this paper we introduce a modified version of a gaussian standard first-order autoregressive process where we allow for a dependence structure between the state variable $Y_{t-1}$ and the next innovation $ξ_t$. We call this model dependent innovations gaussian AR(1) process (DIG-AR(1)). We analyze the moment and temporal dependence properties of the new model. After proving that the OLS estimator does not consistently estimate the autoregressive parameter, we introduce an infeasible estimator and we provide its $\sqrt{T}$-asymptotic normality.
Gaussian mixture models are widely used to study clustering problems. These model-based clustering methods require an accurate estimation of the unknown data density by Gaussian mixtures. In Maugis and Michel (2009), a penalized maximum likelihood estimator is proposed for automatically selecting the number of mixture components. In the present paper, a collection of univariate densities whose logarithm is locally β-Hölder with moment and tail conditions are considered. We show that this penalized estimator is minimax adaptive to the β regularity of such densities in the Hellinger sense.
In this paper we propose a generalization of a class of Gaussian Semiparametric Estimators (GSE) of the fractional differencing parameter for long-range dependent multivariate time series. We generalize a known GSE-type estimator by introducing some modifications at the objective function level regarding the process' spectral density matrix estimator. We study large sample properties of the estimator without assuming Gaussianity as well as hypothesis testing. The class of models considered here satisfies simple conditions on the spectral density function, restricted to a small neighborhood of …
We consider covariance parameter estimation for a Gaussian process under inequality constraints (boundedness, monotonicity or convexity) in fixed-domain asymptotics. We address the estimation of the variance parameter and the estimation of the microergodic parameter of the Matérn and Wendland covariance functions. First, we show that the (unconstrained) maximum likelihood estimator has the same asymptotic distribution, unconditionally and conditionally to the fact that the Gaussian process satisfies the inequality constraints. Then, we study the recently suggested constrained maximum likelihoo…
We consider statistical models driven by Gaussian and non-Gaussian self-similar processes with long memory and we construct maximum likelihood estimators (MLE) for the drift parameter. Our approach is based on the approximation by random walks of the driving noise. We study the asymptotic behavior of the estimators and we give some numerical simulations to illustrate our results.
Confidence intervals based on penalized maximum likelihood estimators such as the LASSO, adaptive LASSO, and hard-thresholding are analyzed. In the known-variance case, the finite-sample coverage properties of such intervals are determined and it is shown that symmetric intervals are the shortest. The length of the shortest intervals based on the hard-thresholding estimator is larger than the length of the shortest interval based on the adaptive LASSO, which is larger than the length of the shortest interval based on the LASSO, which in turn is larger than the standard interval based on the ma…
We study confidence intervals based on hard-thresholding, soft-thresholding, and adaptive soft-thresholding in a linear regression model where the number of regressors $k$ may depend on and diverge with sample size $n$. In addition to the case of known error variance, we define and study versions of the estimators when the error variance is unknown. In the known variance case, we provide an exact analysis of the coverage properties of such intervals in finite samples. We show that these intervals are always larger than the standard interval based on the least-squares estimator. Asymptotically,…
This paper developed an inference problem for Vasicek model driven by a general Gaussian process. We construct a least squares estimator and a moment estimator for the drift parameters of the Vasicek model, and we prove the consistency and the asymptotic normality. Our approach extended the result of Xiao and Yu (2018) for the case when noise is a fractional Brownian motion with Hurst parameter H \in [1/2,1).
We study the weak convergence (in the high-frequency limit) of the parameter estimators of power spectrum coefficients associated with Gaussian, spherical and isotropic random fields. In particular, we introduce a Whittle-type approximate maximum likelihood estimator and we investigate its asympotic weak consistency and Gaussianity, in both parametric and semiparametric cases.
Simultaneous inference for high-dimensional non-Gaussian time series is always considered to be a challenging problem. Such tasks require not only robust estimation of the coefficients in the random process, but also deriving limiting distribution for a sum of dependent variables. In this paper, we propose a multiplier bootstrap procedure to conduct simultaneous inference for the transition coefficients in high-dimensional non-Gaussian vector autoregressive (VAR) models. This bootstrap-assisted procedure allows the dimension of the time series to grow exponentially fast in the number of observ…
In this work, we consider the deterministic optimization using random projections as a statistical estimation problem, where the squared distance between the predictions from the estimator and the true solution is the error metric. In approximately solving a large scale least squares problem using Gaussian sketches, we show that the sketched solution has a conditional Gaussian distribution with the true solution as its mean. Firstly, tight worst case error lower bounds with explicit constants are derived for any estimator using the Gaussian sketch, and the classical sketching is shown to be th…
We prove a uniform in bandwidth law of the iterated logarithm for the maximal deviation of kernel copula estimators from their expectations. We deal especially with the \textit{local linear}, the \textit{mirror-reflection} and the \textit{transformation} estimators. These results are useful for establishing the strong uniform in bandwidth consistency of these kernel estimators.
Subtractive dither is a powerful method for removing the signal dependence of quantization noise for coarsely-quantized signals. However, estimation from dithered measurements often naively applies the sample mean or midrange, even when the total noise is not well described with a Gaussian or uniform distribution. We show that the generalized Gaussian distribution approximately describes subtractively-dithered, quantized samples of a Gaussian signal. Furthermore, a generalized Gaussian fit leads to simple estimators based on order statistics that match the performance of more complicated maxim…
Additive models play an important role in semiparametric statistics. This paper gives learning rates for regularized kernel based methods for additive models. These learning rates compare favourably in particular in high dimensions to recent results on optimal learning rates for purely nonparametric regularized kernel based quantile regression using the Gaussian radial basis function kernel, provided the assumption of an additive model is valid. Additionally, a concrete example is presented to show that a Gaussian function depending only on one variable lies in a reproducing kernel Hilbert spa…
Hard thresholding, LASSO , adaptive LASSO and SCAD point estimators have been suggested for use in the linear regression context when most of the components of the regression parameter vector are believed to be zero, a sparsity type of assumption. Potscher and Schneider, 2010, Electronic Journal of Statistics, have considered the properties of fixed-width confidence intervals that include one of these point estimators (for all possible data values). They consider a normal linear regression model with orthogonal regressors and show that these confidence intervals are longer than the standard co…
We discuss the possibilities and limitations of estimating the mean of a real-valued random variable from independent and identically distributed observations from a non-asymptotic point of view. In particular, we define estimators with a sub-Gaussian behavior even for certain heavy-tailed distributions. We also prove various impossibility results for mean estimators.
We construct an adaptive wavelet estimator that attains minimax near-optimal rates in a wide range of Besov balls. The convergence rates are affected only by the weakest dependence amongst the channels, and take into account both noise sources.
This work is intended as a contribution to a wavelet-based adaptive estimator of the memory parameter in the classical semi-parametric framework for Gaussian stationary processes. In particular we introduce and develop the choice of a data-driven optimal bandwidth. Moreover, we establish a central limit theorem for the estimator of the memory parameter with the minimax rate of convergence (up to a logarithm factor). The quality of the estimators are attested by simulations.
In numerous applications data are observed at random times and an estimated graph of the spectral density may be relevant for characterizing and explaining phenomena. By using a wavelet analysis, one derives a nonparametric estimator of the spectral density of a Gaussian process with stationary increments (or a stationary Gaussian process) from the observation of one path at random discrete times. For every positive frequency, this estimator is proved to satisfy a central limit theorem with a convergence rate depending on the roughness of the process and the moment of random durations between …
This paper proposes feasible asymptotically efficient estimators for a certain class of Gaussian noises with self-similar and stationary properties, which includes the fractional Gaussian noise, under high frequency observations. In this setting, the optimal rate of estimation depends on whether either the Hurst or diffusion parameters is known or not. This is due to the singularity of the asymptotic Fisher information matrix for simultaneous estimation of the above two parameters. One of our key ideas is to extend the Whittle estimation method to the situation of high frequency observations. …
We consider a time series $X=\{X_k, k\in\mathbb{Z}\}$ with memory parameter $d\in\mathbb{R}$. This time series is either stationary or can be made stationary after differencing a finite number of times. We study the "Local Whittle Wavelet Estimator" of the memory parameter $d$. This is a wavelet-based semiparametric pseudo-likelihood maximum method estimator. The estimator may depend on a given finite range of scales or on a range which becomes infinite with the sample size. We show that the estimator is consistent and rate optimal if $X$ is a linear process and is asymptotically normal if $X$…
The asymptotic analysis of covariance parameter estimation of Gaussian processes has been subject to intensive investigation. However, this asymptotic analysis is very scarce for non-Gaussian processes. In this paper, we study a class of non-Gaussian processes obtained by regular non-linear transformations of Gaussian processes. We provide the increasing-domain asymptotic properties of the (Gaussian) maximum likelihood and cross validation estimators of the covariance parameters of a non-Gaussian process of this class. We show that these estimators are consistent and asymptotically normal, alt…
Robustness to outliers is often a desirable property of statistical estimators. Indeed many well known estimators offer very good optimal performance in theory but are unusable in applied contexts because of their sensitivity to outliers. Of particular interest to the authors is the case of covariance estimators in adaptive matched filtering schemes in signal processing applications such as RADAR and SONAR detection, for which a contamination by outliers of the estimated noise covariance can lead to a great impact on performances, in particular when these outliers are similar to the target sig…
We present results on parameter estimation and non-parameter estimation of the linear partially observed Gaussian system of stochastic differential equations. We propose new one-step estimators which have the same asymptotic properties as the MLE, but much more simple to calculate, the estimators are so-called "estimator-processes". The construction of the estimators is based on the equations of Kalman-Bucy filtration and the asymptotic corresponds to the small noises in the observations and state (hidden process) equations. We propose conditions which provide the consistency and asymptotic no…
We study the problem of estimating the covariance parameters of a one-dimensional Gaussian process with exponential covariance function under fixed-domain asymptotics. We show that the weighted pairwise maximum likelihood estimator of the microergodic parameter can be consistent or inconsistent. This depends on the range of admissible parameter values in the likelihood optimization. On the other hand, the weighted pairwise conditional maximum likelihood estimator is always consistent. Both estimators are also asymptotically Gaussian when they are consistent. Their asymptotic variances are larg…
We study the problem of estimating the mean of a random vector $X$ given a sample of $N$ independent, identically distributed points. We introduce a new estimator that achieves a purely sub-Gaussian performance under the only condition that the second moment of $X$ exists. The estimator is based on a novel concept of a multivariate median.
We consider the problem of estimating the mean $f$ of a Gaussian vector $Y$ with independent components of common unknown variance $σ^{2}$. Our estimation procedure is based on estimator selection. More precisely, we start with an arbitrary and possibly infinite collection $\FF$ of estimators of $f$ based on $Y$ and, with the same data $Y$, aim at selecting an estimator among $\FF$ with the smallest Euclidean risk. No assumptions on the estimators are made and their dependencies with respect to $Y$ may be unknown. We establish a non-asymptotic risk bound for the selected estimator. As particul…
We study the problem of estimating an unknown vector $θ$ from an observation $X$ drawn according to the normal distribution with mean $θ$ and identity covariance matrix under the knowledge that $θ$ belongs to a known closed convex set $Θ$. In this general setting, Chatterjee (2014) proved that the natural constrained least squares estimator is "approximately admissible" for every $Θ$. We extend this result by proving that the same property holds for all convex penalized estimators as well. Moreover, we simplify and shorten the original proof considerably. We also provide explicit upper and low…
