Empirical-likelihood-based hypothesis tests for the means of two zero-inflated populations

Abstract

In this paper, we propose a novel nonparametric method based on the adjusted empirical likelihood (AEL) and the transformed empirical likelihood (TEL), which are two modified versions of the empirical likelihood (EL). The proposed method is considered to conduct a hypothesis test for the equality of the means of two populations containing many zeroes. The asymptotic results have been established. Simulations are conducted under various scenarios to investigate the performance of the proposed method as well as in comparison with the EL, AEL, TEL and the normal approximation (NA) in terms of type I error rates and powers. All methods are applied to four datasets to illustrate the hypothesis testing procedure.

Keywords:

• Adjusted empirical likelihood
• Hypothesis testing
• Transformed adjusted empirical likelihood
• Transformed empirical likelihood
• Zero-inflated populations

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the anonymous reviewer for his/her constructive comments and suggestions which helped to improve this manuscript significantly, Ning's research was supported by Simons Foundation (grant number 711800).

Additional information

Funding

Ning's research was supported by Simons Foundation (grant number 711800).