Two-sample two-stage and purely sequential methodologies for tests of hypotheses with applications: comparing normal means when the two variances are unknown and unequal

In this paper, we develop appropriate sampling methodologies for testing hypotheses regarding the difference of mean values from two independent (or dependent) normal populations when their variances are unknown and unequal. We design two-stage and purely sequential testing methodologies of hypotheses for comparing the unknown means by determining the appropriate sample sizes while controlling both type-I and type-II error probabilities at or below preassigned levels α, β respectively. Such methodologies are constructed under both unequal and equal sample size designs. We prove that both two-stage and purely sequential testing strategies enjoy a number of practically appealing properties. Extensive sets of computer simulations and real data analyses empirically validate our theoretical findings.     

Two-stage procedures for the bounded risk point estimation of the parameter and hazard rate in two families of distributions

Two families of distributions are considered that cover a large number of probability distributions useful in investigations involving reliability studies and survival analyses. The problem of bounded risk point estimation of the parameter and hazard rate function of the two families of distribution is handled. Motivated by Mukhopadhyay and Pepe (2006 Mukhopadhyay, N. and Pepe, W. (2006). Exact Bounded Risk Estimation When the Terminal Sample Size and Estimator Are Dependent: The Exponential Case, Sequential Analysis 25: 85–101.[Taylor &; Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]), Roughani and Mahmoudi (2015 Roughani, G. and Mahmoudi, E. (2015). Exact Risk Evaluation of the Two-Stage Estimation of the Gamma Scale Parameter under Bounded Risk Constraint, Sequential Analysis 34: 387–405.[Taylor &; Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), and Mahmoudi and Lalehzari (2017 Mahmoudi, E. and Lalehzari, R. (2017). Bounded Risk Estimation of the Hazard Rate Function of the Exponential Distribution: Two-Stage Procedure, Sequential Analysis 36: 38–54.[Taylor &; Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), two-stage procedures are developed based on the maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) as well as uniformly minimum variance unbiased estimator (UMVUE). The estimation problem based on the minimum mean square estimator (MMSE) is also considered. We establish that the MMSE of the parameter and hazard rate provides a smaller risk.