On the sensitivity of the one-sided t test to covariance misspecification

Sensitivity analysis stands in contrast to diagnostic testing in that sensitivity analysis aims to answer the question of whether it matters that a nuisance parameter is non-zero, whereas a diagnostic test ascertains explicitly if the nuisance parameter is different from zero. In this paper, we introduce and derive the finite sample properties of a sensitivity statistic measuring the sensitivity of the t statistic to covariance misspecification. Unlike the earlier work by Banerjee and Magnus [A. Banerjee, J.R. Magnus, On the sensitivity of the usual t- and F-tests to covariance misspecification, Journal of Econometrics 95 (2000) 157-176] on the sensitivity of the F statistic, the theorems derived in the current paper hold under both the null and alternative hypotheses. Also, in contrast to Banerjee and Magnus' [see the above cited reference] results on the F test, we find that the decision to accept the null using the OLS based one-sided t test is not necessarily robust against covariance misspecification and depends much on the underlying data matrix. Our results also indicate that autocorrelation does not necessarily weaken the power of the OLS based t test. © 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.