[HN Gopher] Generalized Sequential Probability Ratio Test for Fa...
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       Generalized Sequential Probability Ratio Test for Families of
       Hypotheses [pdf]
        
       Author : luu
       Score  : 18 points
       Date   : 2026-02-20 07:59 UTC (3 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (sites.stat.columbia.edu)
 (TXT) w3m dump (sites.stat.columbia.edu)
        
       | measurablefunc wrote:
       | Great. How do I use this in my life to make things better?
        
         | glial wrote:
         | The SPRT is probably already making your life better: it's used
         | to decrease the cost of medical trails, optimize
         | classifications in high-stakes examinations (i.e. for medical
         | certifications), detect defective manufacturing processes, etc.
         | It sounds like this paper extends the method to groups of
         | hypotheses, whereas the basic version is limited to a null
         | hypothesis and an alternative hypothesis.
        
         | data-ottawa wrote:
         | This helps with determining when have you observed enough data
         | to make a decision.
         | 
         | A/B tests, monitoring metrics, health, quality control all use
         | this.
         | 
         | If you use LLMs, you might use this to determine if a model
         | update or prompt change impacts results using fewer tokens.
        
       | noelwelsh wrote:
       | From 2014, with 43 cites in Google Scholar:
       | https://scholar.google.com/scholar?cites=4354840623154369813...
       | 
       | Might want to check the cites for more recent work ("Efficiency
       | in sequential testing" looks relevant) and also the literature on
       | "bandit best arm identification", which seems to be distinct from
       | this line of work but tackles broadly the same problem.
        
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       (page generated 2026-02-23 23:00 UTC)