# Confused with MCMC Metropolis-Hastings variations: Random-Walk, Non-Random-Walk, Independent, Metropolis

Over the past few weeks I have been trying to understand MCMC and the Metropolis-Hastings algorithm(s). Every time I think I understand it I realise that I am wrong. Most of the code examples I find on-line implement something that is not consistent with the description. i.e.: They say they implement Metropolis-Hastings but they actually implement random-walk metropolis. Others (almost always) silently skip the implementation of the Hastings correction ratio because they are using a symmetric proposal distribution. Actually, I haven't found a single simple example that calculates the ratio so far. That makes me even more confused. Can someone give me code examples (in any language) of the following:

• Vanilla Non-Random Walk Metropolis-Hastings Algorithm with Hastings correction ratio calculation (even if this will end up being 1 when using a symmetric proposal distribution).
• Vanilla Random Walk Metropolis-Hastings algorithm.
• Vanilla Independent Metropolis-Hastings algorithm.

No need to provide the Metropolis algorithms because if I am not mistaken the only difference between Metropolis and Metropolis-Hastings is that the first ones always sample from a symmetric distribution and thus they don't have the Hastings correction ratio. No need to give detailed explanation of the algorithms. I do understand the basics but I am kinda confused with all the different names for the different variations of the Metropolis-Hastings algorithm but also with how you practically implement the Hastings correction ratio on the Vanilla non-random-walk MH. Please don't copy paste links that partially answer my questions because most likely I have already seen them. Those links led me to this confusion. Thank you.

Here you go - three examples. I've made the code much less efficient than it would be in a real application in order to make the logic clearer (I hope.)

# We'll assume estimation of a Poisson mean as a function of x
x <- runif(100)
y <- rpois(100,5*x)  # beta = 5 where mean(y[i]) = beta*x[i]

# Prior distribution on log(beta): t(5) with mean 2
# (Very spread out on original scale; median = 7.4, roughly)
log_prior <- function(log_beta) dt(log_beta-2, 5, log=TRUE)

# Log likelihood
log_lik <- function(log_beta, y, x) sum(dpois(y, exp(log_beta)*x, log=TRUE))

# Random Walk Metropolis-Hastings
# Proposal is centered at the current value of the parameter

rw_proposal <- function(current) rnorm(1, current, 0.25)
rw_p_proposal_given_current <- function(proposal, current) dnorm(proposal, current, 0.25, log=TRUE)
rw_p_current_given_proposal <- function(current, proposal) dnorm(current, proposal, 0.25, log=TRUE)

rw_alpha <- function(proposal, current) {
# Due to the structure of the rw proposal distribution, the rw_p_proposal_given_current and
# rw_p_current_given_proposal terms cancel out, so we don't need to include them - although
# logically they are still there:  p(prop|curr) = p(curr|prop) for all curr, prop
exp(log_lik(proposal, y, x) + log_prior(proposal) - log_lik(current, y, x) - log_prior(current))
}

# Independent Metropolis-Hastings
# Note: the proposal is independent of the current value (hence the name), but I maintain the
# parameterization of the functions anyway.  The proposal is not ignorable any more
# when calculation the acceptance probability, as p(curr|prop) != p(prop|curr) in general.

ind_proposal <- function(current) rnorm(1, 2, 1)
ind_p_proposal_given_current <- function(proposal, current) dnorm(proposal, 2, 1, log=TRUE)
ind_p_current_given_proposal <- function(current, proposal) dnorm(current, 2, 1, log=TRUE)

ind_alpha <- function(proposal, current) {
exp(log_lik(proposal, y, x)  + log_prior(proposal) + ind_p_current_given_proposal(current, proposal)
- log_lik(current, y, x) - log_prior(current) - ind_p_proposal_given_current(proposal, current))
}

# Vanilla Metropolis-Hastings - the independence sampler would do here, but I'll add something
# else for the proposal distribution; a Normal(current, 0.1+abs(current)/5) - symmetric but with a different
# scale depending upon location, so can't ignore the proposal distribution when calculating alpha as
# p(prop|curr) != p(curr|prop) in general

van_proposal <- function(current) rnorm(1, current, 0.1+abs(current)/5)
van_p_proposal_given_current <- function(proposal, current) dnorm(proposal, current, 0.1+abs(current)/5, log=TRUE)
van_p_current_given_proposal <- function(current, proposal) dnorm(current, proposal, 0.1+abs(proposal)/5, log=TRUE)

van_alpha <- function(proposal, current) {
exp(log_lik(proposal, y, x)  + log_prior(proposal) + ind_p_current_given_proposal(current, proposal)
- log_lik(current, y, x) - log_prior(current) - ind_p_proposal_given_current(proposal, current))
}

# Generate the chain
values <- rep(0, 10000)
u <- runif(length(values))
naccept <- 0
current <- 1  # Initial value
propfunc <- van_proposal  # Substitute ind_proposal or rw_proposal here
alphafunc <- van_alpha    # Substitute ind_alpha or rw_alpha here
for (i in 1:length(values)) {
proposal <- propfunc(current)
alpha <- alphafunc(proposal, current)
if (u[i] < alpha) {
values[i] <- exp(proposal)
current <- proposal
naccept <- naccept + 1
} else {
values[i] <- exp(current)
}
}
naccept / length(values)
summary(values)

For the vanilla sampler, we get:

> naccept / length(values)
[1] 0.1737
> summary(values)
Min. 1st Qu.  Median    Mean 3rd Qu.    Max.
2.843   5.153   5.388   5.378   5.594   6.628

which is a low acceptance probability, but still... tuning the proposal would help here, or adopting a different one. Here's the random walk proposal results:

> naccept / length(values)
[1] 0.2902
> summary(values)
Min. 1st Qu.  Median    Mean 3rd Qu.    Max.
2.718   5.147   5.369   5.370   5.584   6.781

Similar results, as one would hope, and a better acceptance probability (aiming for ~50% with one parameter.)

And, for completeness, the independence sampler:

> naccept / length(values)
[1] 0.0684
> summary(values)
Min. 1st Qu.  Median    Mean 3rd Qu.    Max.
3.990   5.162   5.391   5.380   5.577   8.802

Because it doesn't "adapt" to the shape of the posterior, it tends to have the poorest acceptance probability and is hardest to tune well for this problem.

Note that generally speaking we'd prefer proposals with fatter tails, but that's a whole other topic.

• Hi. Thank you so much for the great answer. Sorry for the very late reply but I am just curious. It seems to me that the "independence sampler" is worthless. Its proposal distribution $Q$ should be similar to the posterior distribution in order to sample good points. Am I right? Or Is there any situation where we would prefer it? Aug 23, 2019 at 15:49
• @floyd - it is useful in a number of situations, for example, if you have a decent idea of the location of the center of the distribution (e.g., because you calculated the MLE or MOM estimates) and can pick a fat-tailed proposal distribution, or if computation time per iteration is very low in which case you can run a very long chain (which makes up for low acceptance rates) - thus saving you analysis and programming time, which might be much greater than even inefficient runtime. It wouldn't be the typical first try proposal, though, that would likely be the random walk. Aug 23, 2019 at 16:12
• Really thank you so much for replying to my comment. There is another weird thing about the independent Metropolis-Hastings. The $Q$ is NOT a transition distribution(because it's constant), meaning that it doesn't represent $p(x_{t+1}|x_t)$ which means that independent Metropolis-Hastings is not MCMC or a Markov chain. Am I right? Aug 24, 2019 at 13:41
• Sure it is. Just because $p(x_{t+1}|x_t) = p(x_{t+1})$ doesn't mean it isn't a Markov chain. It's just one that doesn't even depend on the current state, which is a special case of "depends only upon the current state", at least in the MC world. Aug 24, 2019 at 13:57

See:

By construction, the algorithm does not depend on the normalization constant, since what matters is the ratio of the pdf's. The variation of the algorithm in which the proposal pdf $q()$ is not symmetric is due to Hasting (1970) and for this reason the algorithm is often also called Metropolis-Hasting. Moreover, what has been described here is the global Metropolis algorithm, in contrast to the local one, in which a cycle affects only one component of ${\bf x}$.

The Wikipedia article is a good complementary read. As you can see, the Metropolis also has a "correction ratio" but, as mentioned above, Hastings introduced a modification that allows for non-symmetric proposal distributions.

The Metropolis algorithm is implemented in the R package mcmc under the command metrop().

Other code examples:

http://www.mas.ncl.ac.uk/~ndjw1/teaching/sim/metrop/

http://pcl.missouri.edu/jeff/node/322

http://darrenjw.wordpress.com/2010/08/15/metropolis-hastings-mcmc-algorithms/

• Thank you for your reply. Unfortunately it does not answer any of my questions. I only see random-walk metropolis, non-random-walk metropolis and independent M-H. The Hastings correction ratio dnorm(can,mu,sig)/dnorm(x,mu,sig) in the independence sampler of the first link is not equal to 1. I thought it was supposed to be equal to 1 when using a symmetric proposal distribution. Is this because that is an independene sampler and not a plain Non-Random-Walk M-H? If yes, what is the Hastings ratio for a Plain Non-Random-walk M-H? Jul 19, 2013 at 4:23
• @AstrOne - using a symmetric proposal distribution is not sufficient to make the proposal ignorable when calculating the M-H acceptance probability. Your example shows why. What you need is $p(\text{current}|\text{proposal}) = p(\text{proposal}|\text{current})$, i.e., if the ratio doesn't equal 1, you can't ignore them. Oct 17, 2013 at 15:03