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Theory of Statistics - George Mason University

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158 2 Distribution <strong>Theory</strong> and Statistical Models<br />

use as probability models. It is interesting to note that <strong>of</strong> all distributions with<br />

given first and second moments and having a PDF dominated by Lebesgue<br />

measure, the one with maximum entropy is the normal (Exercise 1.88).<br />

Characterizing a Family <strong>of</strong> Distributions<br />

A probability family or family <strong>of</strong> distributions, P = {Pθ, θ ∈ Θ}, is a set<br />

<strong>of</strong> probability distributions <strong>of</strong> a random variable that is defined over a given<br />

sample space Ω. The index <strong>of</strong> the distributions may be just that, an arbitrary<br />

index in some given set Θ which may be uncountable, or it may be some<br />

specific point in a given set Θ in which the value <strong>of</strong> θ carries some descriptive<br />

information about the distribution; for example, θ may be a 2-vector in which<br />

one element is the mean <strong>of</strong> the distribution and the other element is the<br />

variance <strong>of</strong> the distribution.<br />

The distribution functions corresponding to the members <strong>of</strong> most interesting<br />

families <strong>of</strong> distributions that we will discuss below do not constitute a<br />

distribution function space as defined on page 746. This is because mixtures <strong>of</strong><br />

distributions in most interesting families <strong>of</strong> distributions are not members <strong>of</strong><br />

the same family. That is, distributions defined by convex linear combinations<br />

<strong>of</strong> CDFs generally are not members <strong>of</strong> the same family <strong>of</strong> distributions. On<br />

the other hand, <strong>of</strong>ten linear combinations <strong>of</strong> random variables do have distributions<br />

in the same family <strong>of</strong> distributions as that <strong>of</strong> the individual random<br />

variables. (The sum <strong>of</strong> two normals is normal; but a mixture <strong>of</strong> two normals<br />

is not normal.) Table 1.1 on page 58 lists a number <strong>of</strong> families <strong>of</strong> distributions<br />

that are closed under addition <strong>of</strong> independent random variables.<br />

Likelihood Functions<br />

The problem <strong>of</strong> fundamental interest in statistics is to identify a particular<br />

distribution within some family <strong>of</strong> distributions, given observed values <strong>of</strong> the<br />

random variable. Hence, in statistics, we may think <strong>of</strong> θ or Pθ as a variable.<br />

A likelihood function is a function <strong>of</strong> that variable.<br />

Definition 2.1 (likelihood function)<br />

Given a PDF fθ, which is a function whose argument is a value <strong>of</strong> a random<br />

variable x, we define a likelihood function as a function <strong>of</strong> θ for the fixed x:<br />

L(θ | x) = fθ(x).<br />

The PDF fθ(x) is a function whose argument is a value <strong>of</strong> a random variable<br />

x for a fixed θ; the likelihood function L(θ | x) is a function <strong>of</strong> θ for a fixed x;<br />

see Figure 1.2 on page 21.<br />

In statistical applications we may be faced with the problem <strong>of</strong> choosing<br />

between two distributions Pθ1 and Pθ2. For a given value <strong>of</strong> x, we may base<br />

<strong>Theory</strong> <strong>of</strong> <strong>Statistics</strong> c○2000–2013 James E. Gentle

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