The effect of latent and error non-normality on corrections to the test statistic in structural equation modeling

In structural equation modeling, several corrections to the likelihood-ratio model test statistic have been developed to counter the effects of non-normal data. Previous robustness studies investigating the performance of these corrections typically induced non-normality in the indicator variables. However, non-normality in the indicators can originate from non-normal errors or non-normal latent factors. We conducted a Monte Carlo simulation to analyze the effect of non-normality in factors and errors on six different test statistics based on maximum likelihood estimation by evaluating the effect on empirical rejection rates and derived indices (RMSEA and CFI) for different degrees of non-normality and sample sizes. We considered the uncorrected likelihood-ratio model test statistic and the Satorra–Bentler scaled test statistic with Bartlett correction, as well as the mean and variance adjusted test statistic, a scale-shifted approach, a third moment-adjusted test statistic, and an approach drawing inferences from the relevant asymptotic chi-square mixture distribution. The results indicate that the values of the uncorrected test statistic—compared to values under normality—are associated with a severely inflated type I error rate when latent variables are non-normal, but virtually no differences occur when errors are non-normal. Although no general pattern regarding the source of non-normality for all analyzed measures of fit can be derived, the Satorra–Bentler scaled test statistic with Bartlett correction performed satisfactorily across conditions.

Undergraduate students’ errors on interval estimation based on variance neglect

Interval estimation is an important topic, especially in drawing conclusions on an event. Mathematics education students must possess the skill to formulate and use interval estimation. The errors of mathematics education students in formulating wrong interval estimates indicate a low understanding of interval estimation. This study explores the errors of mathematics education students in interpreting the variance in the questions regarding selecting the proper test statistic to formulate the interval estimation of mean accurately. Respondents in this study involved 36 students of mathematics education (N = 9 males, N = 27 females). This research is qualitative research with a qualitative descriptive approach. Data collection was carried out using the respondents’ ability test and interviews. The respondents’ ability test instrument was tested on 36 students and declared valid where r-count r-table with r-table of 0.3291, and declared reliable with a Cronbach Alpha value of 0.876 0.6. Through an exploratory approach, data were analyzed by categorizing, reducing, and interpreting to conclude students' abilities and thinking methods in formulating interval estimation of the mean based on the variance in questions. The results showed that mathematics education students neglected the variance, so they could not determine the test statistics correctly, resulting in error interval estimates. This study provides insight into the thinking methods of mathematics education students on variance in interval estimation problems in the hope of anticipating errors in formulating interval estimation problems.

“THE STUDY TO ASSESS AN INCIDENCE OF FEVER IN POST-OPERATIVE PATIENTS ADMITTED IN SURGICAL ICU AT NATIONAL CANCER INSTITUTE, DHARAMPETH, NAGPUR.”

INTRODUCTION: Postoperative fever is one of the most common problems seen in the postoperative ward. Most cases of fever immediately following surgery are self-limiting. The appearance of postoperative fever is not limited to specic types of surgery. Fever can occur immediately after surgery and seen to be related directly to the operation or may occur sometime after the surgery as a result of an infection at the surgical site or infections that involve organs distant from the surgery. Objectives: To study the common causes of post operative fever in general surgery patients. To study the correlation between the cause and the day of onset of fever. To study the risk factors associated with post operative fever. Material and Method: In this study Descriptive Research Design was used. The samples were 30 Post operative patients which fulls inclusion criteria. Setting of the study was surgical ICU, National cancer Institute, Dharampeth, Nagpur. RESULTS:-The result of this study shows that There 6 patients in the age group of 41yrs to 60 yrs having increase WBC count. Fisher exact test statistic value is 0.0449. The result is signicant at p < .05. so the post operative fever is signicantly associated with gender of the patient, Types of surgery and increase WBC count in Patient.

A sequential test to compare the real-time fatality rates of a disease among multiple groups with an application to COVID-19 data

Infectious diseases, such as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, pose a significant threat to public health globally. Fatality rate serves as a key indicator for the effectiveness of potential treatments or interventions. With limited time and understanding of novel emerging epidemics, comparisons of the fatality rates in real-time among different groups, say, divided by treatment, age, or area, have an important role to play in informing public health strategies. We propose a statistical test for the null hypothesis of equal real-time fatality rates across multiple groups during an ongoing epidemic. An elegant property of the proposed test statistic is that it converges to a Brownian motion under the null hypothesis, which allows one to develop a sequential testing approach for rejecting the null hypothesis at the earliest possible time when statistical evidence accumulates. This property is particularly important as scientists and clinicians are competing with time to identify possible treatments or effective interventions to combat the emerging epidemic. The method is widely applicable as it only requires the cumulative number of confirmed cases, deaths, and recoveries. A large-scale simulation study shows that the finite-sample performance of the proposed test is highly satisfactory. The proposed test is applied to compare the difference in disease severity among Wuhan, Hubei province (exclude Wuhan) and mainland China (exclude Hubei) from February to March 2020. The result suggests that the disease severity is potentially associated with the health care resource availability during the early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic in mainland China.

Detection of Gamma-rays from Protostellar Jet in the HH 80-81 System

Considering that the existence of relativistic particles in the protostellar jet has been confirmed by the detection of linearly polarized radioemission from the HH 80-81 jet, we search for gamma-rays from the HH 80-81 system using ten-year {\it Fermi}-LAT observations.A significant point-like $\gamma$-ray excess is found in the direction of the HH 80-81 system with Test-Statistic (TS) value $>$100, which is likely produced in the HH 80-81 jet. The $\gamma$-ray spectrum extends only to 1 GeV with a photon index of 3.5.No significant variability is found in the gamma-ray emission.It is discussed that the properties of HH 80-81 jet suffice for producing the observed $\gamma$-rays.

A Modified Chi-square Type Test for Distributional Validity with Applications to Right Censored Reliability and Medical Data

In this paper, a modified Chi-square goodness-of-fit test called the modified Bagdonavičius-Nikulin goodness-of-fit test statistic is investigated and the applied for distributional validation under the right censored case. The new modified goodness-of-fit test is presented and applied for the right censored data sets. The algorithm of the censored Barzilai-Borwein is employed via a comprehensive simulation study for assessing validity of the new test. The modified Bagdonavičius-Nikulin test is applied to four real and right censored data sets. A new distribution is compared with many other competitive distributions under the new modified Bagdonavičius-Nikulin goodness-of-fit test statistic.

A test for fuzzy exponentiality based on Kullback-Leibler information

The exponential distribution has been widely used in engineering, social and biological sciences. In this paper, we propose a new goodness-of-fit test for fuzzy exponentiality using α-pessimistic value. The test statistics is established based on Kullback-Leibler information. By using Monte Carlo method, we obtain the empirical critical points of the test statistic at four different significant levels. To evaluate the performance of the proposed test, we compare it with four commonly used tests through some simulations. Experimental studies show that the proposed test has higher power than other tests in most cases. In particular, for the uniform and linear failure rate alternatives, our method has the best performance. A real data example is investigated to show the application of our test.

USP: an independence test that improves on Pearson’s chi-squared and the G -test

We present the U -statistic permutation (USP) test of independence in the context of discrete data displayed in a contingency table. Either Pearson’s χ 2 -test of independence, or the G -test, are typically used for this task, but we argue that these tests have serious deficiencies, both in terms of their inability to control the size of the test, and their power properties. By contrast, the USP test is guaranteed to control the size of the test at the nominal level for all sample sizes, has no issues with small (or zero) cell counts, and is able to detect distributions that violate independence in only a minimal way. The test statistic is derived from a U -statistic estimator of a natural population measure of dependence, and we prove that this is the unique minimum variance unbiased estimator of this population quantity. The practical utility of the USP test is demonstrated on both simulated data, where its power can be dramatically greater than those of Pearson’s test, the G -test and Fisher’s exact test, and on real data. The USP test is implemented in the R package USP .

Orthogonal decomposition of the sum-symmetry model for square contingency tables with ordinal categories: Use of the exponential sum-symmetry model

Summary In the existing decomposition theorem, the sum-symmetry model holds if and only if both the exponential sum-symmetry and global symmetry models hold. However, this decomposition theorem does not satisfy the asymptotic equivalence for the test statistic. To address the aforementioned gap, this study establishes a decomposition theorem in which the sum-symmetry model holds if and only if both the exponential sum-symmetry and weighted global-sum-symmetry models hold. The proposed decomposition theorem satisfies the asymptotic equivalence for the test statistic. We demonstrate the advantages of the proposed decomposition theorem by applying it to datasets comprising real data and artificial data.