Bootstrap confidence intervals and hypothesis tests for extrema of parameters

The bootstrap provides effective and accurate methodology for a wide variety of statistical problems which might not otherwise enjoy practicable solutions. However, there still exist important problems where standard bootstrap estimators are not consistent, and where alternative approaches, for example the m-out-of-n bootstrap and asymptotic methods, also face significant challenges. One of these is the problem of constructing confidence intervals or hypothesis tests for extrema of parameters, for example for the maximum of p parameters where each has to be estimated from data. In the present paper we suggest approaches to solving this problem. We use the bootstrap to construct an accurate estimator of the joint distribution of centred parameter estimators, and we base the procedure, either a confidence interval or a hypothesis test, on that distribution estimator. Our methodology is designed so that it errs on the side of conservatism, modulo the small inaccuracy of the bootstrap step. Copyright 2010, Oxford University Press.