ON PARAMETER-ESTIMATION FOR PAIRWISE INTERACTION POINT-PROCESSES

Pairwise interaction point processes form a useful class of models for spatial point patterns, especially patterns for which the spatial distribution of points is more regular than for a homogeneous planar Poisson process. Several authors have proposed methods for estimating the parameters of a pairwise interaction point process. However, there appears to be no general theory which provides grounds for preferring a particular method, nor have any extensive empirical comparisons been published. In this paper, we review three general methods of estimation which have been proposed in the literature and present the results of a comparative simulation study of the three methods.