The secretary problem for selecting one item so as to minimize its expected rank, based on observing the relative ranks only, is revisited. A simple suboptimal rule, which performs almost as well as the optimal rule, is given. The rule stops with the smallest i such that Ri = ic/(n + 1 - i) for...

The present paper studies the limiting behavior of the average score of a sequentially selected group of items or individuals, the underlying distribution of which, F, belongs to the Gumbel domain of attraction of extreme value distribution. This class contains the Normal, log Normal, Gamma,...

A robust procedure for estimating the five parameters of a mixture of two normals is proposed. The procedure is based on a robustification of the steps of the EM algorithm. This results in the use of an iteratively reweighted median and MAD. Simulation results are presented that show the...

We consider a sequential rule, where an item is chosen into the group, such as a university faculty member, only if his score is better than the average score of those already belonging to the group. We study four variables: The average score of the members of the group after k items have been...

In many situations, the decision maker observes items in sequence and needs to determine whether or not to retain a particular item immediately after it is observed. Any decision rule creates a set of items that are selected. We consider situations where the available information is the rank of...