Non-Asymptotic Sequential Tests for Overlapping Hypotheses and application to near optimal arm identification in bandit models

Abstract

In this paper, we study sequential testing problems with \emph{overlapping} hypotheses. We first focus on the simple problem of assessing if the mean $\mu$ of a Gaussian distribution is smaller or larger than a fixed $\epsilon>0$; if $\mu\in(-\epsilon,\epsilon)$, both answers are considered to be correct. Then, we consider PAC-best arm identification in a bandit model: given $K$ probability distributions on $\mathbb{R}$ with means $\mu_1,\dots,\mu_K$, we derive the asymptotic complexity of identifying, with risk at most $\delta$, an index $I\in\{1,\dots,K\}$ such that $\mu_I\geq \max_i\mu_i -\epsilon$. We provide non-asymptotic bounds on the error of a parallel General Likelihood Ratio Test, which can also be used for more general testing problems. We further propose lower bound on the number of observation needed to identify a correct hypothesis. Those lower bounds rely on information-theoretic arguments, and specifically on two versions of a change of measure lemma (a high-level form, and a low-level form) whose relative merits are discussed.