Robust Linear Models#
[1]:
%matplotlib inline
[2]:
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import numpy as np
import statsmodels.api as sm
Estimation#
Load data:
[3]:
data = sm.datasets.stackloss.load()
data.exog = sm.add_constant(data.exog)
Huber’s T norm with the (default) median absolute deviation scaling
[4]:
huber_t = sm.RLM(data.endog, data.exog, M=sm.robust.norms.HuberT())
hub_results = huber_t.fit()
print(hub_results.params)
print(hub_results.bse)
print(
hub_results.summary(
yname="y", xname=[f"var_{i}" for i in range(len(hub_results.params))]
)
)
const -41.026498
AIRFLOW 0.829384
WATERTEMP 0.926066
ACIDCONC -0.127847
dtype: float64
const 9.791899
AIRFLOW 0.111005
WATERTEMP 0.302930
ACIDCONC 0.128650
dtype: float64
Robust Linear Model Regression Results
==============================================================================
Dep. Variable: y No. Observations: 21
Model: RLM Df Residuals: 17
Method: IRLS Df Model: 3
Norm: HuberT
Scale Est.: mad
Cov Type: H1
Date: Thu, 27 Aug 2026
Time: 07:04:47
No. Iterations: 19
==============================================================================
coef std err z P>|z| [0.025 0.975]
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
var_0 -41.0265 9.792 -4.190 0.000 -60.218 -21.835
var_1 0.8294 0.111 7.472 0.000 0.612 1.047
var_2 0.9261 0.303 3.057 0.002 0.332 1.520
var_3 -0.1278 0.129 -0.994 0.320 -0.380 0.124
==============================================================================
If the model instance has been used for another fit with different fit parameters, then the fit options might not be the correct ones anymore .
Huber’s T norm with ‘H2’ covariance matrix
[5]:
hub_results2 = huber_t.fit(cov="H2")
print(hub_results2.params)
print(hub_results2.bse)
const -41.026498
AIRFLOW 0.829384
WATERTEMP 0.926066
ACIDCONC -0.127847
dtype: float64
const 9.089504
AIRFLOW 0.119460
WATERTEMP 0.322355
ACIDCONC 0.117963
dtype: float64
Andrew’s Wave norm with Huber’s Proposal 2 scaling and ‘H3’ covariance matrix
[6]:
andrew_mod = sm.RLM(data.endog, data.exog, M=sm.robust.norms.AndrewWave())
andrew_results = andrew_mod.fit(scale_est=sm.robust.scale.HuberScale(), cov="H3")
print("Parameters: ", andrew_results.params)
Parameters: const -40.881796
AIRFLOW 0.792761
WATERTEMP 1.048576
ACIDCONC -0.133609
dtype: float64
See help(sm.RLM.fit) for more options and module sm.robust.scale for scale options
Comparing OLS and RLM#
Artificial data with outliers:
[7]:
nsample = 50
x1 = np.linspace(0, 20, nsample)
X = np.column_stack((x1, (x1 - 5) ** 2))
X = sm.add_constant(X)
sig = 0.3 # smaller error variance makes OLS<->RLM contrast bigger
beta = [5, 0.5, -0.0]
y_true2 = np.dot(X, beta)
y2 = y_true2 + sig * 1.0 * np.random.normal(size=nsample)
y2[[39, 41, 43, 45, 48]] -= 5 # add some outliers (10% of nsample)
Example 1: quadratic function with linear truth#
Note that the quadratic term in OLS regression will capture outlier effects.
[8]:
res = sm.OLS(y2, X).fit()
print(res.params)
print(res.bse)
print(res.predict())
[ 5.20285916 0.50189949 -0.01223037]
[0.46005788 0.07102673 0.00628477]
[ 4.89709981 5.14983909 5.39850328 5.64309238 5.88360638 6.12004529
6.3524091 6.58069783 6.80491145 7.02504999 7.24111343 7.45310178
7.66101504 7.8648532 8.06461627 8.26030424 8.45191712 8.63945491
8.82291761 9.00230521 9.17761772 9.34885513 9.51601745 9.67910468
9.83811682 9.99305386 10.14391581 10.29070266 10.43341442 10.57205109
10.70661267 10.83709915 10.96351054 11.08584683 11.20410804 11.31829414
11.42840516 11.53444108 11.63640191 11.73428764 11.82809829 11.91783383
12.00349429 12.08507965 12.16258992 12.23602509 12.30538517 12.37067016
12.43188006 12.48901486]
Estimate RLM:
[9]:
resrlm = sm.RLM(y2, X).fit()
print(resrlm.params)
print(resrlm.bse)
[ 5.13361608e+00 4.90325495e-01 -2.77268058e-03]
[0.15389811 0.02375979 0.00210237]
Draw a plot to compare OLS estimates to the robust estimates:
[10]:
fig = plt.figure(figsize=(12, 8))
ax = fig.add_subplot(111)
ax.plot(x1, y2, "o", label="data")
ax.plot(x1, y_true2, "b-", label="True")
pred_ols = res.get_prediction()
iv_l = pred_ols.summary_frame()["obs_ci_lower"]
iv_u = pred_ols.summary_frame()["obs_ci_upper"]
ax.plot(x1, res.fittedvalues, "r-", label="OLS")
ax.plot(x1, iv_u, "r--")
ax.plot(x1, iv_l, "r--")
ax.plot(x1, resrlm.fittedvalues, "g.-", label="RLM")
ax.legend(loc="best")
[10]:
<matplotlib.legend.Legend at 0x7f041a735400>
Example 2: linear function with linear truth#
Fit a new OLS model using only the linear term and the constant:
[11]:
X2 = X[:, [0, 1]]
res2 = sm.OLS(y2, X2).fit()
print(res2.params)
print(res2.bse)
[5.69581811 0.37959575]
[0.39502965 0.03403735]
Estimate RLM:
[12]:
resrlm2 = sm.RLM(y2, X2).fit()
print(resrlm2.params)
print(resrlm2.bse)
[5.20505036 0.46854841]
[0.12308667 0.01060565]
Draw a plot to compare OLS estimates to the robust estimates:
[13]:
pred_ols = res2.get_prediction()
iv_l = pred_ols.summary_frame()["obs_ci_lower"]
iv_u = pred_ols.summary_frame()["obs_ci_upper"]
fig, ax = plt.subplots(figsize=(8, 6))
ax.plot(x1, y2, "o", label="data")
ax.plot(x1, y_true2, "b-", label="True")
ax.plot(x1, res2.fittedvalues, "r-", label="OLS")
ax.plot(x1, iv_u, "r--")
ax.plot(x1, iv_l, "r--")
ax.plot(x1, resrlm2.fittedvalues, "g.-", label="RLM")
legend = ax.legend(loc="best")
