On the statistical computation of the sample multiple correlation coefficient
Based on the recursive formulas of Lee (1988) and Singh and Relyea (1992) for computing the noncentral F distribution, a numerical algorithm for evaluating the distributional values of the sample squared multiple correlation coefficient is proposed. The distributional function of this statistic is usually represented as an infinite weighted sum of the iterative form of incomplete beta integral. So an effective algorithm for the incomplete beta integral is crucial to the numerical evaluation of various distribution values. Let a and b denote two shape parameters shown in the incomplete beta integral and hence formed in the sampling distribution function, n be the sample size, and p be the number of random variates. Then both 2a = p - 1 and 2b = n - p are positive integers in sampling situations so that the proposed numerical procedures in this paper are greatly simplified by recursively formulating the incomplete beta integral. By doing this, it can jointly compute the distributional values of probability density function (pdf) and cumulative distribution function (cdf) for which the distributional value of quantile can be more efficiently obtained by Newton's method. In addition, computer codes in C are developed for demonstration and performance evaluation. For the less precision required, the implemented method can achieve the exact value with respect to the finite significant digit desired. In general, the numerical results are apparently better than those by various approximations and interpolations of Gurland and Asiribo (1991), Gurland and Milton (1970), and Lee (1971, 1972). When b = (1/2)(n - p) is an integer in particular, the finite series formulation of Gurland (1968) is used to evaluate the pdf/cdf values without truncation errors, which are served as the pivotal one. By setting the implemented codes with double precisions, the infinite series form of derived method can achieve the pivotal values for almost all cases under study. Related comparisons and illustrations are also presented.
statistical computing multiple correlation coefficient incomplete beta integral error bound