Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t8hqh Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-28T07:54:54.606Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Compound poisson approximations for the numbers of extreme spacings

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 2016

Małgorzata Roos*
Affiliation:
University of Zurich
*
* Postal address: Institut für Angewandte Mathematik, Rämistr. 74, CH-8001 Zürich, Switzerland. E-mail address: [email protected]

Abstract

The accuracy of the Poisson approximation to the distribution of the numbers of large and small m-spacings, when n points are placed at random on the circle, was analysed using the Stein–Chen method in Barbour et al. (1992b). The Poisson approximation for m≧2 was found not to be as good as for 1-spacings. In this paper, rates of approximation of these distributions to suitable compound Poisson distributions are worked out, using the CP–Stein–Chen method and an appropriate coupling argument. The rates are better than for Poisson approximation for m≧2, and are of order O((log n)2/n) for large m-spacings and of order O(1/n) for small m-spacings, for any fixed m≧2, if the expected number of spacings is held constant as n → ∞.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Applied Probability Trust 1993 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

This work was supported in part by the Schweizerischer Nationalfonds Grants Nos 21–25579.88 and 20–31262.91.

References

Abramowitz, M. and Stegun, I. A. (1970) Handbook of Mathematical Functions. Dover, New York.Google Scholar
Alm, S. E. (1983) On the distribution of the scan statistic of a Poisson process. In Probability and Mathematical Statistics, Essays in Honour of Carl-Gustav Esseen, ed. Gut, A. and Holst, L., pp. 110. Department of Mathematics, Uppsala University.Google Scholar
Barbour, A. D. and Holst, L. (1989) Some applications of the Stein-Chen method for proving Poisson convergence. Adv. Appl. Prob. 21, 7490.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barbour, A. D., Chen, L. H. Y. and Loh, W.-L. (1992a) Compound Poisson approximation for nonnegative random variables via Stein's method. Ann. Prob. 20, 18431866.Google Scholar
Barbour, A. D., Holst, L. and Janson, S. (1992b) Poisson Approximation. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Darling, D. A. (1953) On a class of problems related to the random division of an interval. Ann. of Math. Statist. 24, 239253.Google Scholar
Dembo, A. and Karlin, S. (1992) Poisson approximation for r-scan processes. Ann. Appl. Prob. 2, 329357.Google Scholar
Holst, L. (1980a) On the lengths of the pieces of a stick broken at random. J. Appl. Prob. 17, 623634.Google Scholar
Holst, L. (1980b) On multiple covering of a circle with random arcs. J. Appl. Prob. 17, 284290.Google Scholar
Holst, L. and Hüsler, J. (1984) On the random coverage of the circle. J. Appl. Prob. 21, 558566.Google Scholar
Holst, L., Kennedy, J. and Quine, H. (1988) Rates of Poisson convergence for some coverage and urn problems using coupling. J. Appl. Prob. 25, 717724.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hüsler, J. (1982a) Random coverage of the circle and asymptotic distributions. J. Appl. Prob. 19, 578587.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hüsler, J. (1982b) A note on higher order spacings. Technical Report, Department of Mathematical Statistics, University of Bern.Google Scholar
Janson, S. (1984) Bounds on the distributions of extremal values of a scanning process. Stoch. Proc. Appl. 18, 313328.Google Scholar
Pyke, R. (1965) Spacings. J. R. Statist. Soc. B 27, 395449.Google Scholar
Pyke, R. (1972) Spacings revisited. Proc. 6th Berkeley Symp. Math. Statist. Prob. 1, 417427.Google Scholar
Solomon, H. (1978) Geometric Probability. SIAM, Philadelphia.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Whittaker, E. T. and Watson, G. N. (1962) A Course of Modern Analysis. Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar