I am currently working on a statistical project where I need to estimate a conditional expectation $E[Y|X=x_i]$ using the Nadaraya-Watson estimator. For doing that, I have the sample $(x_1,y_1),...,(x_n,y_n)$, where $n=14$, and I have chosen the bandwidth $h$ such that : $h = n^{-\frac{1}{5}}=0.5899$, given that the common rule of thumb is to have $h \propto n^{-\frac{1}{5}}$ for optimality.

However, I do not get in what sense that $h$ is optimal. Indeed, I am using R, the ksmooth function with a normal kernel : ksmooth(X,Y,"normal",bandwidth=h).This is what I get if I choose such a $h$:

While if for example I choose $h$ equal to 3 (so around 5 times bigger), I get a way smoother curve, which is what really interests me:

Could someone explain me in what sense having $h \propto n^{-\frac{1}{5}}$ is "optimal"?

What am I sacrificing if I choose a $h$ bigger than the "optimal" one: accuracy, convergence speed, etc.?

I greatly appreciate, thank you very much.

• P.S. this is the second message I post in which my beginning "Hello everyone" is erased, does somebody know why? I wouldn't like to seem rude.
– JJFM
Mar 26 '15 at 18:27
• Well, according to Bochner-Landau notation, both are equivalent big-O. In any case, you should not be computing the bandwidth by hand, but using a rule like Rupert-Sheather-Wand implemented in the KernSmooth package. Mar 26 '15 at 19:17
• Sorry T C, I don't get it, what is equivalent to what? The function you refer to from the KernSmooth package is dpill? The issue here is that my priority is smoothness, and if an optimal bandwidth yields a graph like the 1st one I posted above it is useless, that is why I was asking what do I sacrifice when I increase the bandwidth with respect to some optimal value.
– JJFM
Mar 26 '15 at 19:24
• 5*0.5899 is the same as 0.5899. Please post your data in order to show the performance of different theoretically motivated bandwidth selection rules. Mar 26 '15 at 20:17
• The "Hellos" "Thanks!"es and "Appologies if..." do not contribute to, and in fact distract from questions and answers. Remember your questions here, and responses to them are a collaborative community legacy, not simply a conversation you are having on your own. So those social niceties that work well on, say, social networking sites and forums are inappropriate here. Mar 26 '15 at 21:35

It's optimal in that it minimized the mean (integrated) squared error for a data generating process as a function of some parameters and the sample size. The trick is that "proportional to" means there's an unknown factor multiplying $n^{-\frac{1}{5}}$.

There are various candidates that are more or less data-driven, but the simplest RoT bandwidth when using a second order kernel is $$h=\sigma_x \cdot n^{-\frac{1}{5}}.$$

See Li and Racine, Nonparametric Econometrics: Theory and Practice, bottom of p.66. Usually, one can do much better than this by using CV to pick $h$ instead.

• Ok, thank you @Dimitriy V. Masterov, just a clarification, the standard deviation in your comment is the one from my data?
– JJFM
Mar 27 '15 at 8:59
• Well thank you, I've checked this and the result is way better, in fact the standard deviation times n to the power of -1/5 yields 3.0965 so the curve is quite smooth.
– JJFM
Mar 27 '15 at 9:24
• @JJFM Yes, I added a link to GB with the text. Mar 27 '15 at 16:02
• This is an excellent textbook. Apr 19 '16 at 21:13