Skip to content
Part CCSIR NET June 2024a-tight-prior-wins-a-flat-prior-yields

A tight prior wins a flat prior yields

Let be independent observations; ~ ; where and are known constants and is an unknown parameter. Consider prior for the parameter , where and are known constants, and denotes a normal distribution with mean and variance . Suppose ȳ and are observed sample means. Under squared error loss function, which of the following statements are true?

  1. A.Bayes estimate of tends to as
  2. B.Bayes estimate of tends to ȳ/x̄ as
  3. C.Bayes estimate of tends to the BLUE of as
  4. D.Bayes estimate of tends to MLE of as

You have the answer. Trap Analysis is why the other three were written.

Not a worked solution repeated four times — the specific reasoning error each wrong option was built to reward.

See pricing

50 are analysed free — try those first.

Related counterexample: The MLE is unbiased

More on this topic

The chapter behind this: Maximum likelihood and the method of moments — free to read

From EstimationMLE and method of moments

ShareWhatsAppTelegram