Statistical Inference for a Simple Step Stress Model with Competing Risks Based on Generalized Type-I Hybrid Censoring

This paper investigates a simple step-stress accelerated lifetime test (SSALT) model for the inferential analysis of exponential competing risks data. A generalized type-I hybrid censoring scheme is employed to improve the efficiency and controllability of the test. Firstly, the MLEs for parameters are established based on the cumulative exposure model (CEM). Then the conditional moment generating function (MGF) for unknown parameters is set up using conditional expectation and multiple integral techniques. Thirdly, confidence intervals (CIs) are constructed by the exact MGF-based method, the approximate normality-based method, and the bias-corrected and accelerated (BCa) percentile bootstrap method. Finally, we present simulation studies and an illustrative example to compare the performances of different methods.

The Effect of Green Technology Adoption Strategy on Duopoly Competition

Given consumers’ trade-offs between conventional economic and environmental attributes of products, we provide a game-theoretic model to explore the role of GTA strategy in duopoly competition by incorporating two salient features: Two product types — The green product produced by a firm with GTA strategy and the ordinary product produced by a firm without GTA strategy, and two consumer segments, i.e., the green consumers who are willing to pay for green products and the ordinary consumers who are willing to pay for ordinary products. Our analysis shows that GTA strategy may either increase or decrease the green firm’s quality provision. The subtle relationship between the green firm’s quality strategy and GTA strategy not only affects its own equilibrium performances but its rival’s. We also find that two consumer segments may be better off in the presence of a lower GTA intensity. Additionally, although the GTA strategy benefits the environment, the GTA investment is not the more the better. Finally, we find that GTA strategy would lead to higher social welfare only when the GTA efficiency is high enough. Our work not only provides an alternative economic explanation why some firms choose to implement GTA strategy and some do not in reality, but gives managerial insights for firms with different GTA strategies as well as policy insights for the social planner.

Measuring the Imbalance of Regional Development from Outer Space in China

We develop a statistical framework to use the data of night-time-lights (DN) from satellite to augment official GDP measures, and a non-linear substitution relationship between DN and GDP is given. In this paper, we take advantage of DN instead of GDP to measure the imbalance of regional development (IRD) in China by using the method of bi-dimensional decomposition under the population-weighted coefficient of variation. The method enables us to analyze the contributions of DN components to within-region and between-regions inequality under the framework which has been proposed, we can get the conclusion that the imbalance between-regions rather than within-region is the main reason for the influence of IRD for the whole country in China.

Topic-Feature Lattices Construction and Visualization for Dynamic Topic Number

The topic recognition for dynamic topic number can realize the dynamic update of super parameters, and obtain the probability distribution of dynamic topics in time dimension, which helps to clear the understanding and tracking of convection text data. However, the current topic recognition model tends to be based on a fixed number of topics K and lacks multi-granularity analysis of subject knowledge. Therefore, it is impossible to deeply perceive the dynamic change of the topic in the time series. By introducing a novel approach on the basis of Infinite Latent Dirichlet allocation model, a topic feature lattice under the dynamic topic number is constructed. In the model, documents, topics and vocabularies are jointly modeled to generate two probability distribution matrices: Documents-topics and topic-feature words. Afterwards, the association intensity is computed between the topic and its feature vocabulary to establish the topic formal context matrix. Finally, the topic feature is induced according to the formal concept analysis (FCA) theory. The topic feature lattice under dynamic topic number (TFL_DTN) model is validated on the real dataset by comparing with the mainstream methods. Experiments show that this model is more in line with actual needs, and achieves better results in semi-automatic modeling of topic visualization analysis.

The Dynamic Impact of Structural Oil Price Shocks on the Macroeconomy

In this paper, we apply the structural vector autoregression (SVAR) model to decompose the international oil price shock into oil supply shocks, aggregate demand shocks and oil-specific demand shocks, and then use the DCC-GARCH model to analyse the dynamic correlations between these three kinds of oil price shocks and the macroeconomic variables of several oil importing and exporting countries. To quantify the intensity of the effect of oil shocks on these variables, we propose a measure, conditional expectation (CoE), to capture the percent change of the economic variable under oil price shocks relative to the median state. The time-varying copula model is employed to estimate the proposed measure through time. The empirical results show that, for instance, the impacts of oil price shocks on macroeconomic variables are different in different periods, showing the time-varying characteristics. Additionally, the impacts of oil price shocks on macroeconomic variables show great differences and some similarities among different countries. Finally, we give some policy suggestions for these countries, in particular for China’s special results.

Study on Pollution Cost Control Model under Asymmetric Information Based on Principal Agent

Pollution cost control is key to solve pollution problem. The paper takes pollution control cost of pollution control contract between management authority and pollutant discharge enterprise as research object, considers pollution control quality level, pollution control quality inspection and pollution control cost model, and establishes pollution control cost model of management authority and pollutant discharge enterprise, including rational constraints of pollutant discharge enterprise. And it analyzes principal-agent relationship between the two under condition of asymmetric information, and un-observability of pollution control level is shown as hiding information of sewage enterprises. In essence, it is problem of adverse selection in principal-agent. Pollution control cost of management is objective function. The first order condition of pollution control cost of sewage enterprise is transformed into state space equation, and optimal control of problem is solved by using maximum principle. In particular, management authority, as principal, uses pollution control provisions to reward, punish and encourage pollutant discharge enterprises as agents.

Wavelet-Based Elman Neural Network with the Modified Differential Evolution Algorithm for Forecasting Foreign Exchange Rates

It is challenging to forecast foreign exchange rates due to the non-linear characters of the data. This paper applied a wavelet-based Elman neural network with the modified differential evolution algorithm to forecast foreign exchange rates. Elman neural network has dynamic characters because of the context layer in the structure. It makes Elman neural network suit for time series problems. The main factors, which affect the accuracy of the Elman neural network, included the transfer functions of the hidden layer and the parameters of the neural network. We applied the wavelet function to replace the sigmoid function in the hidden layer of the Elman neural network, and we found there was a “disruption problem” caused by the non-linear performance of the wavelet function. It didn’t improve the performance of the Elman neural network, but made it get worse in reverse. Then, the modified differential evolution algorithm was applied to train the parameters of the Elman neural network. To improve the optimizing performance of the differential evolution algorithm, the crossover probability and crossover factor were modified with adaptive strategies, and the local enhanced operator was added to the algorithm. According to the experiment, the modified algorithm improved the performance of the Elman neural network, and it solved the “disruption problem” of applying the wavelet function. These results show that the performance of the Elman neural network would be improved if both of the wavelet function and the modified differential evolution algorithm were applied integratedly.

Promoting Metro Operation Safety by Exploring Metro Operation Accident Network

Understanding the causation of accidents is essential to promote metro operation safety. In terms of 243 reported metro operation accident cases in China, a directed weighted network was constructed based on complex network theory, where nodes and directed edges denotes factors and event chains respectively. To reveal the key causal factors, the topological characteristics of metro operation accident network (MOAN) were analyzed from both global and local views. The results show that facility-type factors are more closely related to the occurrence of the accidents from the perspectives of average path length and cascading effects. Accident types like train delay and train suspension are the great risk recipients. Key causal factors with large out-degree, out-strength, betweenness centrality and cluster coefficient, such as communication and signal failure, vehicle failure and piling into the train should be noticed. The research framework proposed in the paper is not only applicable to China’s metro operation system, but also appropriate for other transportation system safety studies.

A Range Adjusted Measure of Super-Efficiency in Integer-Valued Data Envelopment Analysis with Undesirable Outputs

DEA (data envelopment analysis) models can be divided into two groups: Radial DEA and non-radial DEA, and the latter has higher discriminatory power than the former. The range adjusted measure (RAM) is an effective and widely used non-radial DEA approach. However, to the best of our knowledge, there is no literature on the integer-valued super-efficiency RAM-DEA model, especially when undesirable outputs are included. We first propose an integer-valued RAM-DEA model with undesirable outputs and then extend this model to an integer-valued super-efficiency RAM-DEA model with undesirable outputs. Compared with other DEA models, the two novel models have many advantages: 1) They are non-oriented and non-radial DEA models, which enable decision makers to simultaneously and non-proportionally improve inputs and outputs; 2) They can handle integer-valued variables and undesirable outputs, so the results obtained are more reliable; 3) The results can be easily obtained as it is based on linear programming; 4) The integer-valued super-efficiency RAM-DEA model with undesirable outputs can be used to accurately rank efficient DMUs. The proposed models are applied to evaluate the efficiency of China’s regional transportation systems (RTSs) considering the number of transport accidents (an undesirable output). The results help decision makers improve the performance of inefficient RTSs and analyze the strengths of efficient RTSs.

A Study of Multi-Scale Relationship Between Investor Sentiment and Stock Index Fluctuation Based on the Analysis of BEMD Spillover Index

According to behavioral finance theory, investor sentiment generally exists in investors’ trading activities and influences financial market. In order to investigate the interaction between investor sentiment and stock market as well as financial industry, this study decomposed investor sentiment, stock price index and SWS index of financial industry into IMF components at different scales by using BEMD algorithm. Moreover, the fluctuation characteristics of time series at different time scales were extracted, and the IMF components were reconstructed into short-term high-frequency components, medium-term important event low-frequency components and long-term trend components. The short-term interaction between investor sentiment and Shanghai Composite Index, Shenzhen Component Index and financial industries represented by SWS index was investigated based on the spillover index. The time difference correlation coefficient was employed to determine the medium-term and long-term correlation among variables. Results demonstrate that investor sentiment has a strong correlation with Shanghai Composite Index, Shenzhen Component Index and different financial industries represented by SWS index at the original scale, and the change of investor sentiment is mainly influenced by external market information. The interaction between most markets at the short-term scale is weaker than that at the original scale. Investor sentiment is more significantly correlated with SWS Bond, SWS Diversified Finance and Shanghai Composite Index at the long-term scale than that at the medium-term scale.