Log-concavity of a joint survival function is proposed as a model for bivariate increasing failure rate (BIFR) distributions. Its connections with or distinctness from other notions of BIFR are discussed. A necessary and sufficient condition for a bivariate survival function to be log-concave (BIFR-LCC) is given that elucidates the impact of dependence between lifetimes on ageing. Illustrative examples are provided to explain BIFR-LCC for both positive and negative dependence.

In this paper we propose a general bivariate random effect model with special emphasis on frailty models and environmental effect models, and present some stochastic comparisons. The relationship between the conditional and the unconditional hazard gradients are derived and some examples are provided. We investigate how the well-known stochastic orderings between the distributions of two frailties translate into the orderings between the corresponding survival functions. These results are used to obtain the properties of the bivariate multiplicative model and the shared frailty model.

Let X = (X1, X2, …, Xn) be an exchangeable random vector, and write X(1:i) = min{X1, X2, …, Xi}, 1 ≤ i ≤ n. In this paper we obtain conditions under which X(1:i) decreases in i in the hazard rate order. A result involving more general (that is, not necessarily exchangeable) random vectors is also derived. These results are applied to obtain the limiting behaviour of the hazard rate function of the lifetimes of various coherent systems in reliability theory. The notions of the Samaniego signatures and the minimal signatures of such systems are extensively used in the paper. An interesting relationship between these two signatures is obtained. The results are illustrated in a series of examples.

The no-aging property and the ℓ1-isotropic model it implies have been introduced to overcome certain shortcomings of the exponential model. However, its definition is abstract and not very useful for practitioners. This paper presents several additional characterizations of the no-aging property. Included are (1) characterizations that appropriately generalize the memoryless property and the constant-failure-rate property of the exponential, (2) behavioral characterizations based on fair bets, and (3) geometric characterizations of the survival and density function and differential-geometric characterizations based on tensor methods.