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This question is to give a general exposition of the relationship between goodness-of-fit statistics in regression analysis, to answer questions like this one.

Consider a nonlinear Gaussian regression model of the form:

$$y_i = f(\mathbf{x}_i, \boldsymbol{\beta}) + \varepsilon_i \quad \quad \quad \quad \quad \varepsilon_i \sim \text{IID N}(0, \sigma^2).$$

There are a number of ways that the goodness-of-fit statistics for this model can be written in terms of each other. In particular, with the Gaussian form it is well-known that the OLS estimator is equivalent to the MLE for the model. In view of this, it should be possible to write the maximised log-likelihood in terms of the goodness-of-fit statistics, and therefore write the AIC and BIC in terms of the goodness-of-fit statistics.

Question: How do you write the AIC and BIC of a regression model in terms of the coefficient-of-determination?

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1 Answer 1

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In Gaussian regression, the MLE for the coefficient vector is equivalent to the OLS estimator, and the MLE for the error variance has its usual form relating to the residual sum-of-squares in the regression. That is, it can be shown that the MLE is related to the goodness-of-fit statistics by:

$$SS_\text{Res} = \sum_{i=1}^n (y_i-f(\mathbf{x}_i, \hat{\boldsymbol{\beta}}_\text{MLE}))^2 \quad \quad \quad \quad \quad \frac{SS_\text{Res}}{n} = \hat{\sigma}_\text{MLE}^2.$$

Consequently, we can write the maximised log-likelihood for the model as:

$$\begin{align} \hat{\ell}_{\mathbf{y}, \mathbf{x}} &\equiv \max_{\boldsymbol{\beta}, \sigma} \ell_{\mathbf{y}, \mathbf{x}} (\boldsymbol{\beta}, \sigma^2) \\[12pt] &= \ell_{\mathbf{y}, \mathbf{x}} (\hat{\boldsymbol{\beta}}_\text{MLE}, \hat{\sigma}_\text{MLE}^2) \\[12pt] &= - \frac{n}{2} \Big[ \ln (2 \pi) + \ln (\hat{\sigma}_\text{MLE}^2) \Big] - \frac{1}{2 \hat{\sigma}_\text{MLE}^2} \sum_{i=1}^n (y_i-f(\mathbf{x}_i, \hat{\boldsymbol{\beta}}_\text{MLE}))^2 \\[8pt] &= - \frac{n}{2} \Big[ \ln (2 \pi) + \ln (\hat{\sigma}_\text{MLE}^2) \Big] - \frac{SS_\text{Res}}{2 \hat{\sigma}_\text{MLE}^2} \\[8pt] &= - \frac{n}{2} \Big[ \ln (2 \pi) + \ln (\hat{\sigma}_\text{MLE}^2) \Big] - \frac{n}{2} \\[8pt] &= - \frac{n}{2} \Big[ \ln (2 \pi) + \ln (SS_\text{Res}) - \ln(n) + 1 \Big]. \\[8pt] \end{align}$$

As can be seen from this equation, the maximised log-likelihood is fully determined by the residual sum-of-squares and the number of data points. It can also be written in terms of other goodness-of-fit quantities if preferred. In particular, taking $s_Y^2 = SS_\text{Tot}/df_\text{Tot}$ to be the sample variance of the response variable, we can write the residual sum-of-squares in terms of the coefficient-of-determination as $SS_\text{Res} = (1-R^2) df_\text{Tot} s_Y^2$. Consequently, we also have the alternative form:

$$\hat{\ell}_{\mathbf{y}, \mathbf{x}} = - \frac{n}{2} \Bigg[ 1+\ln (2 \pi) + \ln \bigg( \frac{df_\text{Tot}}{n} \bigg) + \ln (1-R^2) + \ln (s_Y^2) \Bigg].$$

This latter form shows that the maximised log-likelihood is fully determined by the coefficient-of-determination, the sample variance of the response variable, and the number of data points. Once you have an expression for the maximised log-likelihood, it becomes trivial to get corresponding expressions for the AIC and BIC, to wit:

$$\begin{align} \text{AIC} &= n \Bigg[ 1 + \ln (2 \pi) + \frac{2k}{n} + \ln \bigg( \frac{df_\text{Tot}}{n} \bigg) + \ln (1-R^2) + \ln (s_Y^2) \Bigg], \\[12pt] \text{BIC} &= n \Bigg[ 1+\ln (2 \pi) + \frac{k\ln(n)}{n} + \ln \bigg( \frac{df_\text{Tot}}{n} \bigg) + \ln (1-R^2) + \ln (s_Y^2) \Bigg]. \\[6pt] \end{align}$$


Asymptotic analysis: If we were to hold the number of model terms $k$ constant and take $n \rightarrow \infty$ we have the asymptotic equivalence:

$$\text{AIC} \ \sim \text{BIC} \sim n \Bigg[ 1 + \ln (2 \pi) + \ln (1-R^2) + \ln (s_Y^2) \Bigg].$$

Under broad convergence conditions we also have $1-R^2 \rightarrow \sigma^2/\sigma_Y^2$ and $s_Y^2 \rightarrow \sigma_Y^2$, which gives the asymptotic equivalence:

$$\text{AIC} \ \sim \text{BIC} \sim n \Bigg[ 1 + \ln (2 \pi) + \ln (\sigma^2) \Bigg].$$

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