English

Variational Gaussian Copula Inference

Machine Learning 2016-05-19 v3 Machine Learning Computation

Abstract

We utilize copulas to constitute a unified framework for constructing and optimizing variational proposals in hierarchical Bayesian models. For models with continuous and non-Gaussian hidden variables, we propose a semiparametric and automated variational Gaussian copula approach, in which the parametric Gaussian copula family is able to preserve multivariate posterior dependence, and the nonparametric transformations based on Bernstein polynomials provide ample flexibility in characterizing the univariate marginal posteriors.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1506.05860,
  title  = {Variational Gaussian Copula Inference},
  author = {Shaobo Han and Xuejun Liao and David B. Dunson and Lawrence Carin},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1506.05860},
  year   = {2016}
}

Comments

Appearing in Proceedings of the 19th International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Statistics (AISTATS) 2016, Cadiz, Spain. JMLR: W&CP volume 51

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