Model Selection and Hypothesis Testing based on Objective Probabilities and Bayes Factors

2005 ◽  
pp. 115-149 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luis Raúl Pericchi
Keyword(s):  
Model Selection ◽  
Hypothesis Testing ◽  
Bayes Factors

scholarly journals Obtaining evidence for no effect

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zoltan Dienes
Keyword(s):  
Hypothesis Testing ◽  
Effect Size ◽  
Scale Factor ◽  
Bayes Factors ◽  
Effect Sizes ◽  
Equivalence Testing ◽  
Inferential Statistics ◽  
Practical Advice ◽  
Knowing How ◽  
Relevant Effect

Obtaining evidence that something does not exist requires knowing how big it would be were it to exist. Testing a theory that predicts an effect thus entails specifying the range of effect sizes consistent with the theory, in order to know when the evidence counts against the theory. Indeed, a theoretically relevant effect size must be specified for power calculations, equivalence testing, and Bayes factors in order that the inferential statistics test the theory. Specifying relevant effect sizes for power, or the equivalence region for equivalence testing, or the scale factor for Bayes factors, is necessary for many journal formats, such as registered reports, and should be necessary for all articles that use hypothesis testing. Yet there is little systematic advice on how to approach this problem. This article offers some principles and practical advice for specifying theoretically relevant effect sizes for hypothesis testing.

scholarly journals Bayesian Inference and Testing Any Hypothesis You Can Specify

2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 281-295 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Etz ◽  
Julia M. Haaf ◽  
Jeffrey N. Rouder ◽  
Joachim Vandekerckhove
Keyword(s):  
Bayesian Inference ◽  
Model Selection ◽  
Hypothesis Testing ◽  
Likelihood Ratio ◽  
Special Form ◽  
Null Hypothesis ◽  
Bayes Factor ◽  
Alternative Hypotheses ◽  
Competing Models

Hypothesis testing is a special form of model selection. Once a pair of competing models is fully defined, their definition immediately leads to a measure of how strongly each model supports the data. The ratio of their support is often called the likelihood ratio or the Bayes factor. Critical in the model-selection endeavor is the specification of the models. In the case of hypothesis testing, it is of the greatest importance that the researcher specify exactly what is meant by a “null” hypothesis as well as the alternative to which it is contrasted, and that these are suitable instantiations of theoretical positions. Here, we provide an overview of different instantiations of null and alternative hypotheses that can be useful in practice, but in all cases the inferential procedure is based on the same underlying method of likelihood comparison. An associated app can be found at https://osf.io/mvp53/ . This article is the work of the authors and is reformatted from the original, which was published under a CC-By Attribution 4.0 International license and is available at https://psyarxiv.com/wmf3r/ .

scholarly journals Comparing Gaussian Graphical Models with the Posterior Predictive Distribution and Bayesian Model Selection

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donald Ray Williams ◽  
Philippe Rast ◽  
Luis Pericchi ◽  
Joris Mulder
Keyword(s):  
Model Selection ◽  
Hypothesis Testing ◽  
Graphical Models ◽  
Bayesian Model ◽  
Bayesian Model Selection ◽  
Predictive Distribution ◽  
Network Structures ◽  
Gaussian Graphical Models ◽  
Posterior Predictive Distribution ◽  
Leibler Divergence

Gaussian graphical models are commonly used to characterize conditional independence structures (i.e., networks) of psychological constructs. Recently attention has shifted from estimating single networks to those from various sub-populations. The focus is primarily to detect differences or demonstrate replicability. We introduce two novel Bayesian methods for comparing networks that explicitly address these aims. The first is based on the posterior predictive distribution, with Kullback-Leibler divergence as the discrepancy measure, that tests differences between two multivariate normal distributions. The second approach makes use of Bayesian model selection, with the Bayes factor, and allows for gaining evidence for invariant network structures. This overcomes limitations of current approaches in the literature that use classical hypothesis testing, where it is only possible to determine whether groups are significantly different from each other. With simulation we show the posterior predictive method is approximately calibrated under the null hypothesis ($\alpha = 0.05$) and has more power to detect differences than alternative approaches. We then examine the necessary sample sizes for detecting invariant network structures with Bayesian hypothesis testing, in addition to how this is influenced by the choice of prior distribution. The methods are applied to post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms that were measured in four groups. We end by summarizing our major contribution, that is proposing two novel methods for comparing GGMs, which extends beyond the social-behavioral sciences. The methods have been implemented in the R package BGGM.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document