RafterNet: Probabilistic Predictions in Multi-Response Regression.

A fully nonparametric approach for making probabilistic predictions in multi-response regression problems is introduced. Random forests are used as marginal models for each response variable and, as novel contribution of the present work, the dependence between the multiple response variables is mod...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:American Statistician Vol. 77; no. 4; pp. 406 - 417
Main Authors: Hofert, Marius, Prasad, Avinash, Zhu, Mu
Format: Article
Published: Taylor & Francis Ltd Nov2023
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Online Access:View this record in EBSCOhost
Description
Summary:A fully nonparametric approach for making probabilistic predictions in multi-response regression problems is introduced. Random forests are used as marginal models for each response variable and, as novel contribution of the present work, the dependence between the multiple response variables is modeled by a generative neural network. This combined modeling approach of random forests, corresponding empirical marginal residual distributions and a generative neural network is referred to as RafterNet. Multiple datasets serve as examples to demonstrate the flexibility of the approach and its impact for making probabilistic forecasts.