Optimum Screening Procedures Using Prior Information

Optimum screening procedures using prior information are presented. An optimal cutoff value on the screening variable X minimizing the expected total cost is obtained for the normal model; it is assumed that a continuous screening variable X given a dichotomous performance variable T is normally distributed and that costs are incurred by screening inspection and misclassification errors. Methods for finding optimal cutoff values based on the prior distributions for unknown parameters are presented.