2004/06/24 by R. J. Barlow, Roger Barlow, Barlow, Roger · 1 citation
Decision Sciences · Mathematics · Physics and Astronomy · #Advanced Statistical Methods and Models #Data Analysis #FOS: Physical sciences #High Energy Physics - Experiment (hep-ex) #Scientific Measurement and Uncertainty Evaluation #Statistical and numerical algorithms #Statistics and Probability (physics.data-an) #hep-ex #physics.data-an
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.physics/0406120
14 pages, 5 figures
arxiv created 2004/06/24 · openalex publication_date 2004/06/24 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Asymmetric statistical errors arise for experimental results obtained by Maximum Likelihood estimation, in cases where the number of results is finite and the log likelihood function is not a symmetric parabola. This note discusses how separate asymmetric errors on a single result should be combined, and how several results with asymmetric errors should be combined to give an overall measurement. In the process it considers several methods for parametrising curves that are approximately parabolic.