A scale-free adaptive statistic for testing exponentiality against Weibull and generalized Pareto distributions

Abstract

In Fortiana and Grané (2002) we study a scale-free statistic, based on Hoeffding's maximum correlation, for testing exponentiality. This statistic admits an expansion along a countable set of orthogonal axes, originating a sequence of statistics. Linear combinations of a given number p of terms in this sequence can be written as a quotient of L-statistics. In this paper we propose a scalefree adaptive statistic for testing exponentiality with optimal power against a specific alternative. We obtain its exact distribution and compare it with other scale-free statistics for testing exponentiality, such as the Stephens' modification of the Shapiro-Wilk statistic, the Gini statistic and the Qn statistic defined in Fortiana and Grané (2002).