Boundary Crossing Problems for Sample Means
Lai, Tze Leung
Ann. Probab., Tome 16 (1988) no. 4, p. 375-396 / Harvested from Project Euclid
Motivated by several classical sequential decision problems, we study herein the following type of boundary crossing problems for certain nonlinear functions of sample means. Let $X_1, X_2,\ldots$ be i.i.d. random vectors whose common density belongs to the $k$-dimensional exponential family $h_\theta(x) = \exp\{\theta'x - \psi(\theta)\}$ with respect to some nondegenerate measure $\nu$. Let $\bar{X}_n = (X_1 + \cdots + X_n)/n, \hat\theta_n = (\nabla\psi)^{-1}(\bar{X}_n)$, and let $I(\theta, \lambda) = E_\theta\log\{h_\theta(X_1)/h_\lambda(X_1)\}$ ( = Kullback-Leibler information number). Consider stopping times of the form $T_c(\lambda) = \inf\{n: I(\hat\theta_n, \lambda) \geq n^{-1}g(cn)\}, c > 0$, where $g$ is a positive function such that $g(t) \sim \alpha \log t^{-1}$ as $t \rightarrow 0$. We obtain asymptotic approximations to the moments $E_\theta T^r_c(\lambda)$ as $c \rightarrow 0$ that are uniform in $\theta$ and $\lambda$ with $|\lambda - \theta|^2/c \rightarrow \infty$. We also study the probability that $\bar{X}_{Tc(\lambda)}$ lies in certain cones with vertex $\nabla\psi (\lambda)$. In particular, in the one-dimensional case with $\lambda > \theta$, we consider boundary crossing probabilities of the form $P_\theta\{\hat\theta_n \geq \lambda \text{and} I(\hat\theta_n, \lambda) \geq n^{-1} g(cn) \text{for some} n\}$. Asymptotic approximations (as $c \rightarrow 0$) to these boundary crossing probabilities are obtained that are uniform in $\theta$ and $\lambda$ with $|\lambda - \theta|^2/c \rightarrow \infty$.
Publié le : 1988-01-14
Classification:  Sequential analysis,  stopping time,  boundary crossing probabilities,  exponential family,  Kullback-Leibler information,  uniform strong laws,  60F10,  60G40,  62L05,  62L15
@article{1176991909,
     author = {Lai, Tze Leung},
     title = {Boundary Crossing Problems for Sample Means},
     journal = {Ann. Probab.},
     volume = {16},
     number = {4},
     year = {1988},
     pages = { 375-396},
     language = {en},
     url = {http://dml.mathdoc.fr/item/1176991909}
}
Lai, Tze Leung. Boundary Crossing Problems for Sample Means. Ann. Probab., Tome 16 (1988) no. 4, pp.  375-396. http://gdmltest.u-ga.fr/item/1176991909/