{"title":"Leveraging external information by guided adaptive shrinkage to improve variable selection in high-dimensional regression settings.","authors":"Mark A van de Wiel, Wessel N van Wieringen","doi":"10.1515/ijb-2024-0108","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>Variable selection is challenging for high-dimensional data, in particular when sample size is low. It is widely recognized that external information in the form of complementary data on the variables, 'co-data', may improve results. Examples are known variable groups or <i>p</i>-values from a related study. Such co-data are ubiquitous in genomics settings due to the availability of public repositories, and is likely equally relevant for other applications. Yet, the uptake of prediction methods that structurally use such co-data is limited. We review guided adaptive shrinkage methods: a class of regression-based learners that use co-data to adapt the shrinkage parameters, crucial for the performance of those learners. We discuss technical aspects, but also the applicability in terms of types of co-data that can be handled. This class of methods is contrasted with several others. In particular, group-adaptive shrinkage is compared with the better-known sparse group-lasso by evaluating variable selection. Moreover, we demonstrate the versatility of the guided shrinkage methodology by showing how to 'do-it-yourself': we integrate implementations of a co-data learner and the spike-and-slab prior for the purpose of improving variable selection in genetics studies. We conclude with a real data example.</p>","PeriodicalId":50333,"journal":{"name":"International Journal of Biostatistics","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.2000,"publicationDate":"2025-09-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"International Journal of Biostatistics","FirstCategoryId":"100","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1515/ijb-2024-0108","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"数学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Variable selection is challenging for high-dimensional data, in particular when sample size is low. It is widely recognized that external information in the form of complementary data on the variables, 'co-data', may improve results. Examples are known variable groups or p-values from a related study. Such co-data are ubiquitous in genomics settings due to the availability of public repositories, and is likely equally relevant for other applications. Yet, the uptake of prediction methods that structurally use such co-data is limited. We review guided adaptive shrinkage methods: a class of regression-based learners that use co-data to adapt the shrinkage parameters, crucial for the performance of those learners. We discuss technical aspects, but also the applicability in terms of types of co-data that can be handled. This class of methods is contrasted with several others. In particular, group-adaptive shrinkage is compared with the better-known sparse group-lasso by evaluating variable selection. Moreover, we demonstrate the versatility of the guided shrinkage methodology by showing how to 'do-it-yourself': we integrate implementations of a co-data learner and the spike-and-slab prior for the purpose of improving variable selection in genetics studies. We conclude with a real data example.
期刊介绍:
The International Journal of Biostatistics (IJB) seeks to publish new biostatistical models and methods, new statistical theory, as well as original applications of statistical methods, for important practical problems arising from the biological, medical, public health, and agricultural sciences with an emphasis on semiparametric methods. Given many alternatives to publish exist within biostatistics, IJB offers a place to publish for research in biostatistics focusing on modern methods, often based on machine-learning and other data-adaptive methodologies, as well as providing a unique reading experience that compels the author to be explicit about the statistical inference problem addressed by the paper. IJB is intended that the journal cover the entire range of biostatistics, from theoretical advances to relevant and sensible translations of a practical problem into a statistical framework. Electronic publication also allows for data and software code to be appended, and opens the door for reproducible research allowing readers to easily replicate analyses described in a paper. Both original research and review articles will be warmly received, as will articles applying sound statistical methods to practical problems.