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I am looking for advice on circular statistics. In particular, I'd like to know if any one had any advice/ references that deal with regression models for circular variables and whether it is possible to include random effects as well.

At the moment I can fit very simple models in WinBUGS using wrapped cauchy distributions, but I don't know how to go on to the next step and add either fixed or random effects. Below is the WinBUGS code I have been using so far. I have tested it with simulated data and so far it has performed well, but trying to add in fixed/ random effects has, so far, not worked.

model{
 for (t in 1:N) {

 # likelihood for angles. We use the “ones” trick to sample from the
 # Wrapped Cauchy distribution (see WinBUGS manual)

 ones[t]<- 1
 ones[t] ~ dbern(wc[t])
 wc[t] <- (1/(2*Pi)*(1-rho[t]*rho[t])/(1+rho[t]*rho[t]-2*rho[t]*cos(theta[t]-
 mu.t[t])))/ 300 # Density function for Wrapped Cauchy distribution

 rho[t] <- lambda.t    # mean cosine for the circular distribution
 mu.t[t]<- nu.t# mean direction for turns
 }



 ###### priors for mean direction of angles
 nu.t ~ dunif(-3.14159265359, 3.14159265359)
lambda.t ~ dunif(0,1) # prior for mean cosine of circular distribution
 Pi <- 3.14159265359 # define Pi
 }

## Simulated Data ##
list(theta=c(1.57086666107637,0.624281203067249,4.83586153543422,5.52517105399153,0.250167755691792,5.24413183188724,0.175711907822086,0.503670499719972,0.00587906094477884,0.290131613934322,0.759047889069672,0.57973291007534,3.03128168541491,0.497790655905849,6.24730873150114,2.61159637947433,6.19811892339656,2.21476872674273,0.163464826891718,5.79300356573004,5.65352466175931,-0.0100726021401003,0.00574503925995024,0.260777171784755,5.8545805891331,6.09628602098184,6.07018161953988,5.90921466125829,0.0387070377090986,5.96019978900552,0.270388591408335,0.539775794451919,6.16303548945592,5.54317029065067,1.09867887761604,0.546155012914554,5.73154203573232,6.04837644493341,.242217723020124,0.201937287826239,6.19111529531002,0.602897213838987,5.53590129760264,0.304328180646957,6.12364810518025,0.0781317192586082,2.12148311222615,5.41742779164167,0.109722984863423,0.546244633029087,1.72483899231817,5.81142848191977,5.77431670621736,5.94852063016486,1.21880980868771,0.761391412364464,6.13385885651117,2.3278212791841,-0.00886837423371834,0.0509442654103693,0.919346146608449,0.22243489212092,0.0605109486858312,6.26215798187548,3.35930515203348,4.49262316826849,0.393662386151002,0.408276217352091,5.48604197934124,1.2319358669625,0.290890698266516,0.0356807866706245,5.01603150661483,2.13110569190685,5.58637984768018,0.705401496640296,0.474940761772081,5.58728776070886,6.12311166642116,0.00848809261322299,3.35074107197193,5.82089972193407,0.0531213061461832,5.97904289602246,4.31610462188531,5.61206825679503,0.184081838885041,0.288450927211418,0.594322121025956,1.07062485671203,0.400068367390392,5.08834932305335,4.35542895067301,6.08614182924595,6.14530696852739,5.25070254271081,5.91716602109256,1.78589020077607,6.23955405139402,6.09356179129423), N =100)
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1 Answer

This book by Nick Fisher is very popular. It covers many circular distributions including Cardioid, wrapped Cauchy, wrapped Normal and von MIses distribution. I don't know if it tells you how to generate observations from these distributions, but it gives you a lot of distributions, theory and methods.

Statistical Analysis of Circular Data

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1  
Thanks Procrastinator. I am actually trying to learn how to do that and I tried something similar to what you did but it did not work. – Michael Chernick Aug 15 '12 at 16:45
@Procrastinator Is it necessary for the right bracket after "Data" to be adjacent to the left parenthesis for the link for this to work? – Michael Chernick Aug 15 '12 at 16:47
1  
They have to be together, e.g. [Title](link). Cheers. – user10525 Aug 15 '12 at 16:49
1  
An alternative method is to click the chain link icon just above the field where you type your answer, paste your url in the box that appears, then the code Procrastinator wrote will automatically appear in your answer, and you can type in the link text right there. – Macro Aug 15 '12 at 17:03
Thanks to both of you. – Michael Chernick Aug 15 '12 at 17:04

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