A Family of Hypothesis Tests for a Collection of Short Event Series with an Application to Female Employment Participation

Abstract

Data comprising a collection of short event series are increasingly encountered in social science research. Such series may be expected to be heterogeneous and nonstationary precluding conventional inferential methods. Tests are presented for homogeneity, nonstationarity, and zero order, with appropriate controls. The test procedures are based upon the subdivision of each series into a ‘conditioning sequence’ and an ‘experimental observation’. The tests are applied to data on labour force participation by married women.