mefp {strucchange}R Documentation

Monitoring of Empirical Fluctuation Processes

Description

Online monitoring of structural breaks in a linear regression model. A parameter estimate based on a historical sample is compared with estimates based on newly arriving data; a sequential test on the difference between the two parameter estimates signals structural breaks.

Usage

mefp(obj, ...)

mefp(formula, data, type = c("ME", "fluctuation"), h=1,
    alpha=0.05, functional = c("max", "range"), period=10,
    tolerance=.Machine$double.eps^0.5,
    MECritvalTable=monitorMECritvalTable,
    rescale=FALSE, ...)

mefp(obj, alpha=0.05, functional = c("max", "range"),
    period=10, tolerance=.Machine$double.eps^0.5,
    MECritvalTable=monitorMECritvalTable,
    rescale=NULL, ...)

monitor(obj, data=NULL, verbose=TRUE)

Arguments

formula a symbolic describtion for the model to be tested.
data an optional data frame containing the variables in the model. By default the variables are taken from the environment which efp is called from.
type specifies which type of fluctuation process will be computed.
h (only used for ME processes). A numeric scalar from interval (0,1) specifying the size of the data window relative to the sample size.
obj Object of class "efp" (for mefp) or "mefp" (for monitor).
alpha Significance level of the test, i.e., probability of type I error.
functional Determines if maximum or range of parameter differences is used as statistic.
period (only used for ME processes). Maximum time (relative to the history period) that will be monitored. Default is 10 times the history period.
tolerance Tolerance for numeric == comparisons.
MECritvalTable (only used for ME processes). Table of critical values, this table is interpolated to get critical values for arbitrary alphas. By default the pre-computed table monitorMECritvalTable is used.
rescale If TRUE the estimates will be standardized by the regressor matrix of the corresponding subsample similar to Kuan & Chen (1994); if FALSE the historic regressor matrix will be used. In mefp.efp the default is to take the same value as in the original call of efp.
verbose If TRUE, signal breaks by text output.
... Currently not used.

Details

mefp creates an object of class "mefp" either from a model formula or from an object of class "efp". In addition to the arguments of efp, the type of statistic and a significance level for the monitoring must be specified. The monitoring itself is performed by monitor, which can be called arbitrarily often on objects of class "mefp". If new data have arrived, then the empirical fluctuation process is computed for the new data. If the process crosses the boundaries corresponding to the significance level alpha, a structural break is detected (and signaled).

The typical usage is to initialize the monitoring by creation of an object of class "mefp" either using a formula or an "efp" object. Data available at this stage are considered the history sample, which is kept fixed during the complete monitoring process, and may not contain any structural changes.

Subsequent calls to monitor perform a sequential test of the null hypothesis of no structural change in new data against the general alternative of changes in one or more of the coefficients of the regression model.

Author(s)

Friedrich Leisch

References

Friedrich Leisch, Kurt Hornik, and Chung-Ming Kuan. Monitoring structural changes with the generalized fluctuation test. Econometric Theory, 16:835-854, 2000.

See Also

plot.mefp, boundary.mefp

Examples

df1 <- data.frame(y=rnorm(300))
df1[150:300,"y"] <- df1[150:300,"y"]+1

## use the first 50 observations as history period
e1 <- efp(y~1, data=df1[1:50,,drop=FALSE], type="ME", h=1)
me1 <- mefp(e1, alpha=0.05)

## the same in one function call
me1 <- mefp(y~1, data=df1[1:50,,drop=FALSE], type="ME", h=1,
              alpha=0.05)

## monitor the 50 next observations
me2 <- monitor(me1, data=df1[1:100,,drop=FALSE])
plot(me2)

# and now monitor on all data
me3 <- monitor(me2, data=df1)
plot(me3)

## Load dataset "USIncExp" with income and expenditure in the US
## and choose a suitable subset for the history period
data(USIncExp)
USIncExp3 <- window(USIncExp, start=c(1969,1), end=c(1971,12))
## initialize the monitoring with the formula interface
me.mefp <- mefp(expenditure~income, type="ME", rescale=TRUE,
                   data=USIncExp3, alpha=0.05)

## monitor the new observations for the year 1972
USIncExp3 <- window(USIncExp, start=c(1969,1), end=c(1972,12))
me.mefp <- monitor(me.mefp)

## monitor the new data for the years 1973-1976
USIncExp3 <- window(USIncExp, start=c(1969,1), end=c(1976,12))
me.mefp <- monitor(me.mefp)
plot(me.mefp, functional = NULL)