Subset Selection Procedures: Review and Assessment

SYNOPTIC ABSTRACT

It is well over three decades since statistical inference problems were first posed in the now-familiar selection and ranking framework. This paper deals with the subset-selection theory known as “Gupta's formulation” and developed in large part by Gupta and his associates. Our aim is to provide a historical perspective (Section 2), and trace the major developments that took place in the subset-selection theory over the years 1950-1980, which is divided into three periods representing early developments (Section 3), years of growth (Section 4), and years of further strides (Section 5). We also discuss recent developments (Section 6) and briefly assess the impact of these developments on users (Section 7).

Key Words and Phrases:

• selection and ranking
• subset-selection
• historical perspectives
• early developments
• years of growth
• further strides
• recent developments
• impact on users