E. Brunner et al., BOX-TYPE APPROXIMATIONS IN NONPARAMETRIC FACTORIAL-DESIGNS, Journal of the American Statistical Association, 92(440), 1997, pp. 1494-1502
Linear rank statistics in nonparametric factorial designs are asymptot
ically normal and, in general, heteroscedastic. In a comprehensive sim
ulation study, the asymptotic chi-squared law of the corresponding qua
dratic forms is shown to be a rather poor approximation of the finite-
sample distribution. Motivated by this problem, we propose simple fini
te-sample size approximations for the distribution of quadratic forms
in factorial designs under a normal heteroscedastic error structure. T
hese approximations are based on an F distribution with estimated degr
ees of freedom that generalizes ideas of Patnaik and Box. Simulation s
tudies show that the nominal level is maintained with high accuracy an
d in most cases the power is comparable to the asymptotic maximin Wald
test. Data-driven guidelines are given to select the most appropriate
test procedure. These ideas are finally transferred to nonparametric
factorial designs where the same quadratic forms as in the parametric
case are applied to the vector of averaged ranks. A simulation study s
hows that the corresponding nonparametric ''F-test'' keeps its level w
ith high accuracy and has power comparable to that of the rank version
of the likelihood statistic.