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On the Geometric Ergodicity of Two-Variable Gibbs Samplers

Statistics Theory 2012-06-22 v1 Statistics Theory

Abstract

A Markov chain is geometrically ergodic if it converges to its in- variant distribution at a geometric rate in total variation norm. We study geo- metric ergodicity of deterministic and random scan versions of the two-variable Gibbs sampler. We give a sufficient condition which simultaneously guarantees both versions are geometrically ergodic. We also develop a method for simul- taneously establishing that both versions are subgeometrically ergodic. These general results allow us to characterize the convergence rate of two-variable Gibbs samplers in a particular family of discrete bivariate distributions.

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Cite

@article{arxiv.1206.4770,
  title  = {On the Geometric Ergodicity of Two-Variable Gibbs Samplers},
  author = {Aixin Tan and Galin L. Jones and James P. Hobert},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1206.4770},
  year   = {2012}
}