On the relation between likelihood ratios and p-values for testing success probabilities of Bernoulli trials
Abstract
It is well known that there is no direct one-to-one relation between -values and likelihood ratios or Bayes factors, since their relation crucially involves the sample size . We investigate their (asymptotic) relation in a coin-tossing context where the hypotheses of interest address the success probability of the coin, and where detailed computations are possible. This leads to useful insights in the nature of -values and likelihood ratios. Our results imply, for instance, that under mild conditions, a -value of 0.05 cannot correspond to a likelihood ratio larger than 7.5, for any hypothesis versus a null hypothesis that the success probability has a specific value. We also show it is unlikely one can obtain a large likelihood ratio by tossing a fair coin until the number of heads deviates from the mean by several standard deviations.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2408.12905,
title = {On the relation between likelihood ratios and p-values for testing success probabilities of Bernoulli trials},
author = {Wouter Kager and Ronald Meester},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2408.12905},
year = {2026}
}
Comments
24 pages, 2 figures