Bayesian Data Analysis, Third Edition, 3rd Edition

Chapter 13

Modal and distributional approximations

The early chapters of the book describe simulation approaches that work in low-dimensional problems. With complicated models, it is rare that samples from the posterior distribution can be obtained directly, and Chapters 11 and 12 describe iterative simulation algorithms that can be used with such models. In this chapter we describe various approaches based on distributional approximations. These methods are useful for quick inferences, as starting points for Markov chain simulation algorithms, ...