Penalized empirical likelihood estimation and EM algorithms for closed-population capture-recapture models

Fuente: arXiv
Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Liu, Yang, Li, Pengfei, Liu, Yukun
Format: Preprint
Published: 2022
Subjects:
Online Access:
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1866916840953872384
author Liu, Yang
Li, Pengfei
Liu, Yukun
author_facet Liu, Yang
Li, Pengfei
Liu, Yukun
contents Capture-recapture experiments are widely used to estimate the abundance of a finite population. Based on capture-recapture data, the empirical likelihood (EL) method has been shown to outperform the conventional conditional likelihood (CL) method. However, the current literature on EL abundance estimation ignores behavioral effects, and the EL estimates may not be stable, especially when the capture probability is low. We make three contributions in this paper. First, we extend the EL method to capture-recapture models that account for behavioral effects. Second, to overcome the instability of the EL method, we propose a penalized EL (PEL) estimation method that penalizes large abundance values. We then investigate the asymptotics of the maximum PEL estimator and the PEL ratio statistic. Third, we develop standard expectation-maximization (EM) algorithms for PEL to improve its practical performance. The EM algorithm is also applicable to EL and CL with slight modifications. Our simulation and a real-world data analysis demonstrate that the PEL method successfully overcomes the instability of the EL method and the proposed EM algorithm produces more reliable results than existing optimization algorithms.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2208_05635
institution arXiv
publishDate 2022
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Penalized empirical likelihood estimation and EM algorithms for closed-population capture-recapture models
Liu, Yang
Li, Pengfei
Liu, Yukun
Methodology
Capture-recapture experiments are widely used to estimate the abundance of a finite population. Based on capture-recapture data, the empirical likelihood (EL) method has been shown to outperform the conventional conditional likelihood (CL) method. However, the current literature on EL abundance estimation ignores behavioral effects, and the EL estimates may not be stable, especially when the capture probability is low. We make three contributions in this paper. First, we extend the EL method to capture-recapture models that account for behavioral effects. Second, to overcome the instability of the EL method, we propose a penalized EL (PEL) estimation method that penalizes large abundance values. We then investigate the asymptotics of the maximum PEL estimator and the PEL ratio statistic. Third, we develop standard expectation-maximization (EM) algorithms for PEL to improve its practical performance. The EM algorithm is also applicable to EL and CL with slight modifications. Our simulation and a real-world data analysis demonstrate that the PEL method successfully overcomes the instability of the EL method and the proposed EM algorithm produces more reliable results than existing optimization algorithms.
title Penalized empirical likelihood estimation and EM algorithms for closed-population capture-recapture models
topic Methodology
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2208.05635