An estimator for the number of clusters in a population
ISSN: 1130-4723
Year of publication: 1997
Volume: 9
Issue: 1
Pages: 97-124
Type: Article
More publications in: Revista de la Academia Canaria de Ciencias: = Folia Canariensis Academiae Scientiarum
Abstract
Assume that a random sample is drawn from a population with an unknown number K of clusters. This work propases a nonparametric method to estimate the number of clusters when most of the information is concentrated on the low arder occupancy numbers. This paper derives an estimator to K and proves the asymptotic distribution using a method of Holst (1979). The performance of the estimator is investigated by means of Monte Carla experiments and it is applied to one real data example.