Geophys. J . Int.

(1994) 117, 335-344

Bayesian attenuation regressions: an application to Mexico City
M. Ordaz,'t2 S. K. Si ngh'~~ and A. Arciniega4
'Instituro de Ingenieria, UNA M, Ciudud Universitaria, Coyoacdn 045 10, DF, Mexico
2Cenrro Nacional de Preuencidn de Desustres, Delfiri Madrigal 665, Coyoacdn 04650, D F, Mexico
'Imtituro de Geofisica, UNAM, Ciudad Universitaria, Coyoacan 04510, DF, Mexico
4Centro de Invesfigucih .%mica, Camino a1 Ajusco 203, Tlalpan 14200. DF, Mexico
Accepted 1993 September 14. Received I993 August 25; in original form 1993 March 29
SUMMARY
We describe the application of a bayesian linear regression technique to the problem
of deriving strong-motion attenuation relations. This approach provides a concep-
tual framework for the formal incorporation of knowledge about the involved
phenomena that comes from sources other than the observed data (pri or
information, according to the bayesian terminology). The procedure produces
numerical solutions that are more stable and rational than those obtained from
conventional regression schemes. We illustrate the use of the proposed technique
with the derivation of attenuation laws for the Fourier acceleration spectrum, as a
function of magnitude and distance, at a hill-zone station in Mexico City.
Key words: bayesian regression, ground motion, Mexico City.
INTRODUCTION
Historically, Mexico City has frequently been struck by
earthquakes, which have produced loss of human lives and
severe damage to and collapse of buildings. Ground motions
produced by these events have been recorded in the city
since the early 1960s. At present, the Mexico City
Accelerographic Network is formed by more than 110
three-component digital instruments, operated by three
institutions: Instituto de Ingenieria. UNAM, Fundacidn
J avier Barros Sierra, and the National Center for Disaster
Prevention. The availability of hundreds of accelerograms
has given rise to detailed studies concerning local soil
amplification. The seismic response of soil has successfully
been characterized by empirical transfer functions (Singh et
al. 1988) between soft sites and a reference hill-zone station
(station CU, located in the University City). Since empirical
transfer functions are reasonably well estimated for several
10s of sites within the Valley of Mexico, Fourier
acceleration spectra at these sites can be computed for a
future earthquake if the Fourier spectrum at the reference
station is known. Once the Fourier spectrum at a soft site is
known, other measures of seismic intensity, such as the
response spectrum, can also be estimated.
The simplest way to predict the Fourier spectrum at the
reference station for a given earthquake is to construct
attenuation relations using regression techniques and the
strong-motion recordings obtained at station CU in the last
30 years. Conventional analyses of this type usually find the
unknown parameters of the attenuation relation by carrying
out a linear or non-linear least-squares (LS) fit to the
observed data. However, there is a major disadvantage in
using the LS approach: it is impossible to include properly
the enormous amount of knowledge that we have from
seismological theory and from observations of other regions.
Suppose, for instance, that Q values for a region have been
derived from sources other than strong-motion data. How
does this information influence our results when deriving
attenuation relations for the same region with strong-motion
data?
We present a bayesian estimation technique that allows
for inclusion of the knowledge not directly derived from
observed data. In accordance with bayesian usage, we shall
call this knowledge prior information. We will show how this
information, combined by means of Bayes' theorem with
that contained in the data, gives more stable and reasonable
predictions than those obtained with the LS technique.
Bayesian regression is a well-established technique (see, e.g.
Broemling 1985); to the authors' knowledge, it was used for
the first time in deriving attenuation relations by Veneziano
& Heidari (1985). They imposed bayesian constraints on the
parameters controlling the scaling of several intensity
measures with magnitude. The underlying theory, however,
was not discussed. In this paper we present the theory in
some detail and discuss how theoretical seismological
knowledge can be translated into prior information.
335

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336 M. Ordaz, S. K. Singh and A. Arciniega
THE LEAST- SQUARES APPROACH
The strong-motion data base for this study consists of 23
accelerograms from Mexican subduction zone earthquakes
obtained at station CU since 1965. It includes recordings
from the 1985 September 19 (M=8.1) Michoacan
earthquake. Relevant information about the earthquakes
whose recordings are analysed is given in Table 1. Fig. 1
depicts a map of southern Mexico with epicentre locations.
Data cover the magnitude and distance ranges 5.0 <M <8.1
and 260 <R <466 km, respectively.
Let A ( f ) be the horizontal north-south acceleration
amplitude at station CU for a given frequency f. Consider
the following attenuation model
where R is the closest distance to rupture area, R,,, is the
average radiation pattern, p is the mass density, p is the
shear-wave velocity, =2 (free-surface amplification),
P =0.707 (partition of energy in two horizontal com-
ponents), Q ( f ) is the quality factor and C ( R ) is the
geometrical spreading term, given by
Table 1. Earthquakes whose recordings were used in this study
Event
No.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
1 2a
13'
14'
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
Date
Aug 23 1965
Feb 03 1968
Aug 02 1968
Feb01 1976
Jun07 1976
Mar 19 1978
Nov 29 1978
Mar 14 1979
Oct 25 1981
J un 07 1982
J un 07 1982
Sep 19 1985
Sep 19 1985
Sep 19 1985
Sep21 1985
Sep21 1985
Apr 30 1986
Feb 08 1988
Apr 25 1989
Oct 08 1989
J an 13 1990
May 11 1990
May 31 1990
bicentre
Lat (N)
16.28
16.67
16.25
17.15
17.45
16.85
16.00
17.46
17.75
16.35
16.45
18.14
18.14
18.14
17.62
17.62
18.42
17.00
16.00
17.92
16.84
17.15
17.15
Long (w)
96.02
99.39
98.08
100.23
100.65
99.90
96.69
101.46
102.25
98.37
98.54
102.71
102.71
102.71
101.82
101.82
102.99
101.00
99.00
100.21
99.65
100.85
100.85
M
7.8
5.9
7.4
5.6
6.4
6.4
7.8
7.6
7.3
6.9
7.0
8.1
8.1
8.1
7.6
7.6
7.0
5. 8
6.9
5.1
5.0
5.3
6.1
Distance
(W
466
297
326
282
292
285
414
281
339
304
303
295
295
295
318
318
409
289
304
260
282
295
295
Notes. "Three recordings were obtained in CU during this
earthquake, in instruments located in an area of roughly
2X2km.
The first 11 events were recorded with analogue, low-sensitivity
instruments. All events are shallow, with reported focal depth of
16km.
where R, is a reference distance. This form of G ( R ) leaves
room for different rates of decaying of amplitude with
distance. For instance, a2 =-1 implies attenuation of body
waves. Note that in our study, R >260 km, so surface waves
should predominate and the amplitudes should attenuate as
(l/R)"2, hence a2= -1/2. In eq. (l), S(f) is assumed to be
Brune's (1970) w2 source spectrum:
(3)
where M,, stands for seismic moment and fc is the corner
frequency given by Brune's formula:
f, =4.91 X 106(Au/Mo)"3
(4)
(Mo in dyne-cm, Au, the stress drop, in bars, in km s-I).
M,, and M, the moment magnitude, relate through
(Kanamori 1977)
M =4 log Mo - 10.7.
After taking natural logarithms of both sides of eq. (l), it
can be approximately linearized so that
In A(f ) =d f ) +a,(f)M +%(f) In R +4 f ) R +E, (6)
where al(f), i =0, . . . , 3 are the regression parameters,
and E is a random error. a&) includes moment and
stress-drop related constants (frequency independent), plus
some frequency-dependent terms such as site effects, while
a,(f) controls the scaling with magnitude. a2, which is
assumed to be frequency dependent, controls the geometri-
cal spreading (see eq. 2). a3( f ) is related to Q(f) through
(7)
This model, or variations of it that include terms to
remove the singularity at R =0, or a term in M2, have been
extensively used to relate magnitude and distance with peak
ground acceleration and velocity, response spectral ordin-
ates and Fourier spectra (see, e.g. Esteva & Villaverde
1974; Campbell 1985; J oyner & Boore 1988; Castro, Singh
& Mena 1988).
We estimated a =(ao, aI, a2, a,)T, where T stands for
transpose, and the standard error, by applying an
unconstrained LS fit to our data base. For simplicity, we
have temporarily dropped the dependence of at on f from
the notation. Results are displayed in Fig. 2, where they are
compared with the values obtained using the model of eq.
(1) with R,,@ =0.55, p=2. 8g~m- ~, /3=3.5kms-', and
Au= 100 bar (Singh et al. 1989). Since the LS solution
minimizes the standard error, it certainly approximates the
observed spectra. However, the values of some of the
parameters are so far away from those expected by theory
than one would feel uncomfortable when predicting spectra
for future earthquakes. For instance, the geometrical
spreading term cu, is positive, with values up to 30. This
means that, in the absence of anelastic attenuation,
amplitudes would increase as R3". To compensate for this,
the computed Q-related term a3 is unrealistic. The LS
solution presented in Fig. 1 is clearly unacceptable: some
restrictions have to be imposed on the regression. This has
been done in the past by fixing one or more parameters,
which has resulted, very likely, not from certainty about

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W 0 18
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3
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.-
+ 17
0
-I
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52
Bayesian attenuation regressions
OAXACA
EPICENTRE
p ,50 100 km
I I I I I I I I
- - LS solution
337
-
-104 -103 - 102 -101 - 100 - 99 - 98 - 97 - 96 - 95
Longitude ( OE)
Figure 1. Map of southern Mexico showing the epicentres of the earthquakes used in this study.
.6
-.l o -
4 t
. 2 u
-2 b-
1 .o
.9
.8
.7
.6
.5
.4
.3
-6 -4 L
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
2.2
2.0
1.8
1.6
1.4
1.2
1 .o
.8
-.02
-.04
-.06
-.08
-
-
-
-
a2
40 I
35 t
Figure 2. Parameters cr, ( f ) , i =0, . . . , 3, and u obtained with an unconstrained least-squares fit (LS: solid lines). They are compared with
those computed from the standard attenuation model (SAM: dotted lines). The difference between the LS solution for a;, and the
corresponding value of the SAM (middle top frame) can be interpreted as site effects. Note the unrealistic LS values obtained for cr2 (the
geometrical spreading term) and cr7 (the anelastic attenuation term). Uncertainty is measured by the standard error for the LS fit.

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338 M. Ordaz, S. K. Singh and A. Arciniega
their values, but to remove the instability that LS solutions
usually show. We will present a better alternative to restrict
the regression.
THE BAYESIAN REGRESSION MODEL
Consider again eq. (6), from which E, , the j th value of
random error E is
E,. =a(, + M, +a, InR, +a,Rj - In A,. (8)
Note that in our case each earthquake produces only one
recording, so each value of M and A is associated with a
single value of R. We assume that given a and u, the
random (independent) errors are normally distributed with
zero mean and unknown variance u2. The most important
difference between our approach and the classical estimation
techniques is that we also regard at , i =0, . . . , 3, as
random variables, in the sense that our state of knowledge
about them can be described using probability theory.
We are interested, as a first step, in the probability
distributions of a and u, including our initial state of
knowledge about them and the information contained in the
data. These are the posterior distributions, which can be
found from direct application of Bayes' theorem:
p(a, u I c) ap( a, 1 a, 01, (9)
where E =( el , . . . , ,,)I is the vector of observed errors in
n independent observations, p(a, u IE) is the postcrior joint
density of a and u, p(a, a) is the prior joint density function
of these variables, and L( E 1 a, IT) is the likelihood of the
observed values of E as a function of a and u. The missing
proportionality constant in eq. (9) is such that the integral of
the right-hand side is one. An analytical expression for
~ ( r I a, a) foIIows from our assumption of normality of E 1 a
and from the hypothesis of independent observations:
h
L( E I a, a) =h"" exp ( - E ~ E ) ,
(10)
where h = l /u2 is the precision. For the sake of
mathematical simplicity, in what follows we deal with h
rather than with u.
The prior joint density p(a, h) reflects our state of
knowledge about the unknown parameters before our
examination of the data. This function should include all we
know about these parameters, except for information
present in the observed values of A , M and R. Since
historically prior information has been the most controver-
sial issue of bayesian theory, we discuss this function in
detail later. To describe our prior state of knowledge, we
adopt a prior density function that is said to be a natural
conjugate of the process. These densities have the property
that the functional form of the posterior density function is
the same as that of the prior, and only its parameters are
updated in view of the data. I n this case, the natural
conjugate for a and h is a multivariate normal-gamma
density function (Broemling 1985). This density, as shown in
Appendix A, is completely defined by parameters a', R', r ' ,
and A', which relate to the statistical moments of a and h
through: E(a) =a' , COV(a) =A'R-'/(r' - l ), E( h) =
r ' / A' , and c 2( h ) =l / r' , where E(. ). denotes expectation,
COV(.) stands for covariance matrix, and c ( . ) for coefficient
of variation. Application of Bayes' theorem yields the
posterior expectations and second-order moments of a and
h (see Appendix A):
E( a I E) =(R' +XTX)-'(R'a' +XTy)
COV(a 1 E) =__ (R' +X"'X)- I
(11)
(12)
A"
r" - 1
Efh I E) =,"/A"
c2(h I E) =l / r "
where
n
2
r" =r r +-
,I"+A' +$[a'TR'a' - a"7 Ra " +yTy]
y =(In A , , In A,, . . . , In A,,)"
( I 1 M, 1' In.& I nR, R,
X =
1 M,, In R" R,,
Note from eq. (11) that if R'=O, then E(a 1 E) =
(XTX)-'X'y equals the LS solution. To assign R' a null
value amounts to disregarding all prior knowledge, because
it implies that COV(a) is infinite. We can interpret terms in
eq. (11) additional to the LS solution as the 'bayesian
corrections' that account for prior information. These terms,
as will be shown later, make the numerical process very
stable, and resemble the damping terms that are sometimes
added to the appropriate matrices for this purpose.
We have so far obtained the posterior distributions of a
and h. We are, however, interested in the distribution of
InA given the prior information, the observed data, and a
new set of variables MI and R , , that define the earthquake
for which ground motion needs to be predicted. Let
zT =(1, MI , In R I , R,). Application of Bayes' theorem (see
Appendix A) results in In A having Student's t distribution
with
E(ln A I E, 2) =z TE( a I E)
(19)
and
r
(r " - 1)[1 - z ' ~( R' +XTX +Z Z ~ ) - ' Z ] '
VAR (In A I E, z ) =
(20)
where VAR( ) denotes variance.
APPLICATION TO MEXICO CITY
Prior information
In what follows we present our reasoning to arrive at the
values we used to describe our prior state of knowledge
about the unknown parameters.
For E[ a( , ( f ) ] and E[ a l ( f ) ] we took directly the values
obtained from linearization of the attenuation model of eqs
( 1) - ( 4) , with Re, =0.55, p =2.8 gcm-', p =3.5 km s-'
and A u =100 bar. This implies that a priori we believe that

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Bayesian attenuation regressions 339
real values of a&) and a,(f) are likely to be close to those
predicted by Brunes model. Although site amplifications at
CU are well documented (Ordaz & Singh 1992), we have
ignored them at this point because they were quantified
using many of the strong-motion recordings we are
analysing, and the information contained in the data must
not be used to fix the prior densities as well. Note that the
large site amplifications at CU make almost useless the
spectral attenuation relations derived for other sites.
We must also assign prior uncertainties to ag(f) and
al(f). This quantity controls the scaling with magnitude,
and is better constrained by theory than cuO(f), which
includes site effects. Thus, we should assign cul(f) a smaller
prior variance than to cu,,(f). I t is very unlikely that we
should find a region in which cu,(f) departed more than 0.3
from the value predicted from Brunes model; it is almost
certain that most seismologists would regard as suspicious an
attenuation law in which, for instance, scaled as
exp (1.1M) or exp ( 0. 5M) . We adopted as the most likely
region for each parameter the one that includes 90 per cent
of the total area under the prior density function, that is, the
mean plus minus 1.7 times the standard deviation. For this
reason, we took SD[a,(f)] =0.3/1.7 =0.18, where SD
denotes standard deviation.
For q , ( f ) , our prior state of knowledge is vaguer. We
believe that values predicted by eqs (1)-(4) can not be in
error by more than a factor of 20 (e) either way. We choose
this number because we know of at least one case (the
lake-bed sites in Mexico City) where waves are amplified
much more than 20 times with respect to reasonable values.
We therefore adopted SD[cu,,(f)] =3/1.7 =1.8, which im-
plies a very vague knowledge of a(,(f).
Parameter aZ( f ) is also relatively well constrained by
theory. One possibility would be to make cuZ(f) a
deterministic quantity (hence E[ a&)] =-0.5,
SD[ a2( f ) ] =0) . This does not describe our prior know-
ledge, because this is the way surface waves should at-
tenuate, not the way they actually attenuate. What we
believe is that for our range of distances, a2(f) should not
be far from -0.5, and this is the information we must
describe using a probability density function. Non-negative
values of a2( f ) are untenable on physical grounds. If we
dismiss positive values for a#), then a Gaussian
distribution is inadequate to describe our beliefs about this
parameter, unless, for the sake of simplicity, one assigns
very small prior probabilities to the range a&) 2 0. I n
order to keep mathematics simple, we adopted E[ a, ( f ) ] =
-0.5 and SD[ a2( f ) ] =0.5/1.7 =0.29. We leave room for
a2(f ) to be greater than 0 or smaller than -1.0, but with
small prior probabilities.
For a3( f ) , we have a valuable source of information in
previous studies of Q values for our region of interest
carried out using strong-motion recordings at sites different
from the one we are examining (Castro, Anderson & Singh
1990; Ordaz & Singh 1992). We shall adopt for E[ a, ( f ) ] the
values that can be inferred from the Q values reported by
Ordaz & Singh (1992). According to these authors,
Q(f) =273f-(*, so
(21)
nf -34
q a 3 ( f ) l =- ~ =-3.29 x 1 0 - 3 p 3 4 .
2738
These Q values can not be considered totally correct
since, while they include regional information, they fail to
include the attenuation characteristics of the crust in the
vicinity of station CU. However, in view of the values that
Q takes in other regions of the world with similar geological
conditions, we think that the reported values could not be in
error by more than 100 per cent. We then assigned
Parameter h =l/a2 must also be assigned a prior
probability distribution. Inspection of attenuation relations
derived for other regions shows that typical values of u-the
standard deviation of InA-are usually of the order of 0.7
(note that we are using natural logarithms; in the decimal
scale, u is about 0.3). We adopted this value as E( a) , and
decided that we would consider values outside the range
(0.1, 1.3) as unlikely, in view of which we set SD(o)=
0.6/1.7 =0.35. These moments are associated with r =
2.05, A =0.647 (see Appendix A).
In order t o define completely the prior joint distribution
of a and a, we must fix the entire matrix R. This amounts
to fixing a correlation scheme between pairs of as. Our
prior knowledge does not allow us to estimate second-order
crossed moments, so we set all the prior correlation
coefficients to 0.
Note that the procedure employed to derive E ( a ) is much
the same we would have carried out to derive attenuation
relations for a site where no instrumental information was
available.
S D [ ~~) I =- ~[a~(f )1/ 1. 7.
Posterior values
Application of eqs (11)-(18) yields the posterior expected
values that are shown in Fig. 3, where they are compared
with their respective prior expectations. I n Table 2 we give
the prior and posterior expectations of the as for some
selected frequencies, and we compare them with the values
obtained with the LS fit. In Fig. 4 we compare the observed
spectra of some of the earthquakes used in the study with
the median values predicted by the bayesian attenuation
relation. We show the four earthquakes for which the
prediction is in better agreement with the observation, along
with the four worst predictions. We also computed median
A( f ) for M =8 and different distances; these results are
depicted in Fig. 5 , where we also show the predicted median
spectrum for a hypothetical M =8.2 earthquake that would
take place in the Guerrero gap (see Fig. l), with
R =280 km.
DISCUSSION
The computed attenuation relations
Note from Figs 2 and 3 that, regardless of the statistical
analysis technique, uncertainties at low frequencies are
substantially higher than at high frequencies. This is due, in
part, to the fact that the older accelerograms (see Table 1)
were recorded with low-sensitivity analogue instruments, SO
the quality of data at longer periods is not very good. But
perhaps the main reason is that, although all earthquakes
have a reported depth of about 16 km, slight differences in
source depth might excite different modes of surface waves.
This is of great importance for the prediction of future

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340 M. Ordaz, S. K. Singh and A. Arciniega
1.0
.9
.a
.7
.6
.5
.4
.3
54
52
50
48
46
44
42
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
.,
__ Boyes E(a,)=-0.5
- - - - Prior values
I - - Boyes E(a2)=-l .O
,
I
I
3.0
2.0
1.5
1 .o
.002
.ooo
-.002 -
-.004 -
-.006 -
-
-
-.ooa -
lo-' 100 10' 10-1 100 10'
-1.2- -.010 I I 1 1 I l l l l I I 1 1 1 1 1
Frequency (Hz) Frequency (Hz)
.u
lo-' 100 10'
4
. 2' I I I ' l ( I I I
lo-' 100 10'
Frequency (Hz)
Figure 3. Solid lines: parameters obtained with the bayesian regression technique, assuming E( (yz) =-0.5. Dashed lines: bayesian solutions
with E(cu,) =-1.0. Dotted lines: values of the parameters as predicted by the standard attenuation model described in the text. These values
are taken as prior expectations in the bayesian analyses.
Table 2. Expected prior and posterior values of a;, i =0, . . . , 3 computed using the bayesian regression technique (BAY) with
E( ( Yz) =-0.5, for some selected frequencies. They are compared with the corresponding parameters computed with the unconstrained
least-squares (LS) fit.
Frequency
(Hz)
(Yo Prior
cl , BAY
a. LS
0, Prior
Q1, BAY
a, LS
a, Prior
a, L S
BAY
CU, Prior
a3 L S
Q13 BAY
5.0OD+OO 1.67D+OO 1 .OOD+OO 7.14D-01 5.56D-01 4.550-01 3.85D-01 3.330-01 2.940-01 2.630-01
4.861)+01 4.78D+01 4.67D+01 4.560+01 4.460+01 4.37D+01 4.290+01 4.22D+01 4.16D+01 4.llD+O1
4.991)+01 4.890+01 4.83D+O1 4.77D+01 4.640+01 4.580+01 4.55D+O1 4.480+01 4.35D+O1 4.300+01
4.590+01 4.66D+01 4.71D+01 4.71D+01 4.460+01 4.59D+01 4.45D+O1 4.54D+01 4.08D+01 3.82D+01
?.17D+OO 1.27D+OO 1.41D+00 1.55D+00 1.67D+OO 1.78~+00 1.88D+OO 1.96D+OO 2.04D+00 2.flD+00
9.77D-01 1.25D+00 1.39D+OO 1.50D+00 1.660+00 1.72D+00 1.76D+00 1.81D+00 1.970+00 2.01D+00
5.82D-01 1.13D+O0 1.25D+00 1.33D+00 1.490+00 1.52D+00 1.47D+OO 1.490+00 1.66D+OO 1.63D+00
-5.00D-01 -5.00D-01 -5.000-01 - 5. OOD - 01 - 5. OOD - 01 - 5 , OOD - 0 1 -5. OOD - 0 1 - 5. OOD - 0 1 -5. OOD - 01 -5.00D-01
-4.74D-01 -4.94D-01 -4.851)-01 -5.090-01 -4.580-01 -4.71D-01 -4.89D-01 -4,730-01 -4.31D-01 -4.36D-01
2.25D+O1 1.34D+01 9.740+00 1.090+01 1.15~+01 6.080+00 1.410+01 7.23D+OO 1.71D+01 3.00D+01
-5.68D-03 -3.91D-03 -3.29D-03 -2.93D-03 -2.69D-03 -2.51D-03 -2.38D-03 -2.26D-03 -2.17D-03 -2.09D-03
-4.97D-03 -4.21D-03 -3.48D-03 -3.510-03 -2.58D-03 -2.571)-03 -2.65D-03 -2.381)-03 -1.910-03 -1.90D-03
-6.690-02 -4.420-02 -3.36D-02 -3.9OD-02 -3.631)-02 -2.21D-02 -4.580-02 -2.51D-02 -4.97D-02 -8.860-02
0 Prior 6.990-01 6.990-01 6.99D-01 6.990-01 6.99~)-01 6.99D-01 6.99D-01 6.990-01 6.991)-01 6.991)-01
U BAY 5.34D-01 4.360-01 5.390-01 6.330-01 6.00D-01 7.05D-01 9.00D-01 1.01D+00 8.20D-01 8.460-01
u LS 3.260-01 3.42D-01 4.630-01 5.170-01 5.370-01 6.381)-01 8.15D-01 9.460-01 7.528-01 7.50D-01

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Bayesian attenuation regressions 341
No.9, M=7.3. R=339 No.21, M=5.0, R=282 No.12,13,14, M=8. 1,
102
__ Observed
V
e,
v)
10
10
0
v
Q
100 10-2 100
10-1 1 0 0 10 10-1 100 10 10-1 100 10 10-1 100
No.16, M=7.E, R=318 No.19, M =6. 9, R=304 No.4, M=5. 6. R=282 No.2, M=5. 9, R=297
Q
1 or lo-
lo- 100 10 10-1 100 10 10-1 100 10 10-1 100 10
Frequency (Hz) Frequency (Hz) Frequency (Hz) Frequency (Hz)
Figure 4. Observed (solid lines) and predicted median (dashed lines) spectra using the bayesian attenuation relation with E(cu,) =-0.5 for the
four best (top frames) and the four worst predicted (bottom frames) earthquakes. In each frame we indicate the event number (from Table 1)
and its magnitude and distance. Cases 12, 13 and 14 correspond to the same earthquake, so they are plotted together.
102
n
0
a,
10
-?
E
0
a,
-0
3
v
.w
.- -
E 100
a
10-1
R=300, several magnitudes
102
10
100
R=280, M=8.2
t
__ Predicted
- - - - Observed Sept. 19, 1985
I
I
\
I,
M=8.1. R=295 \
\
,
lo- 100 101,- lo- 100 10
Frequency (Hz) Frequency (Hz)
Figure 5. Left: median spectra predicted using the bayesian regression with !?(a2) =-0.5, for R =300kin and several magnitudes. Right:
median spectrum predicted for a M =8.2, R =280 km, hypothetical earthquake in the Guerrero gap. For comparison, we also plot the
spectrum of the 1985, M =8.1, Michoacan earthquake.
ground motion in Mexico City. Further research should be for the predictions of Fig. 5. Site effects, contained in
devoted to this topic. parameter q,, are independent of magnitude. Therefore,
Note also in the left-hand frame of Fig. 5 that the peak the shift reflects the faster increase of spectral amplitudes
spectral amplitude shifts from about 1 Hz to 0.5 Hz as the with magnitude at low frequencies.
magnitude increases. This shift can not be attributed to the The predicted median spectrum of the hypothetical
effect of Q or geometrical spreading, since distance is fixed M =8.2, R =280 km, Guerrero earthquake (Fig. 5 ,

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342 M. Ordaz, S. K. Singh and A. Arciniega
right-hand frame), shows higher amplitudes than the
spectrum of the 1985 September 19 Michoacan earthquake.
This is not unexpected, since the future earthquake has
larger magnitude and shorter distance. The result implies
that the ground motions experienced in Mexico City during
the 1985 event are not an upper limit.
The bayesian technique
Thefirst question that comes to mind after going through a
bayesian analysis is how dependent are the final results on
the prior parameters. In Fig. 3 we show the posterior
expected values of a and u computed assuming E[ a, ( f ) ] =
-1.0, instead of -0.5, and leaving the rest of the
parameters unchanged. Comparison of both bayesian
solutions shows that, indeed, the posterior expected values
of the parameters depend on our prior choice of E(cu,(f)].
This means that two persons with different prior states of
knowledge would have arrived at different final estimations
of the unknown parameters. But the reason why some of the
final parameters depend so much on the prior values is
because the evidence is not enough to decide for a particular
value.
It has been argued that, because of the inherent
subjectivity of the bayesian approach, it lends itself to the
perpetuation of unrecognized error. In Appendix B we
present a numerical example which demonstrates that this
objection is not justified.
From comparison of results from the LS and bayesian
techniques (Figs 2 and 3) we note that their predictive
powers, measured with the standard error for the LS
approach and with E( u I r) (eq. A8 in Appendix A) for
the bayesian case, respectively, are not very different. Thus,
the prior restrictions we imposed to the data in the bayesian
approach did not result in a much larger variance, so the
solutions are not overconstrained. But since the bayesian
solutions for a are closer to those expected by theory, they
should be preferred.
CONCLUSIONS
We have presented the application of a bayesian regression
technique to derive attenuation relations for the Fourier
spectral accelerations at station CU, Mexico City. This
approach is especially useful when the data are not
conclusive about the values of certain parameters, so we use
prior information to place probabilistic constraints on their
values. After combining prior information and empirical
evidence, we end the analysis with stable and physically
plausible solutions, and with a clear description of our state
of knowledge about the unknown parameters.
The bayesian approach provides a framework to
incorporate rationally a large amount of knowledge that
comes from sources other than the observed data. Although
theoretical knowledge has not been completely ignored in
the past when deriving attenuation relations with conven-
tional techniques, the approach we have outlined permits a
more formal use of this information and provides the
mathematical basis to combine it with observed data.
Numerical work is greater in the proposed technique than in
conventional LS estimation. However, in view of the
advantages of the bayesian
undoubtedly worth doing.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
We thank E. Rosenblueth
analysis, the extra work is
for his encouragement on
applying bayesian statistics to attenuation relations; he, E.
Faccioli, W. B. J oyner, K. L. McLaughlin, S. Ward and an
anonymous reviewer read the original manuscript and made
important constructive suggestions. M. Feriche provided
inspiration, even if unaware of it at that time; R. Rueda
gave valuable advice on the use of bayesian statistics. Data
used in this study have been carefully collected for more
than 25 years by the Seismic Instrumentation Group of the
Institute of Engineering, National Autonomous University
of Mexico (UNAM); this work and that by many others
would not have been possible without their valuable
assistance. This study was partially supported by National
Council for Science and Technology (CONACYT) and
DGAPA, UNAM.
REFERENCES
Brocmling, L.D., 1985. Bayesian Analysis of Linear Models,
Marcel Dekker, Inc., New Y ork.
Brune, J .N., 1970. Tectonic stresses and spectra of seismic waves
from earthquakes, 1. geophys. Res. , 75, 4997-5009.
Campbell, K.W., 1985. Strong motion attenuation relations: A
ten-year perspective, Earthq. Spectru, 1, 759-804.
Castro, R., Singh, S.K. & Mena, E., 1988. An empirical model to
predict Fourier amplitude spcctra of horizontal ground motion,
Earthq. Spectru, 4, 675-686.
Castro, R., Anderson, J .G. & Singh, S.K., 1990. Site response,
attenuation and source spectra of S waves along the Guerrero,
Mexico, subduction zone, Bull. seism. SOC. Am. , 80,
Davis, P.J ., 1972. Gamma function and related functions, in
Handbook of Mathematical Functions, pp. 253-294, eds
Abramowitz, M. & Stegun, I., Dover Publications Inc., New
York.
Esteva, L. & Villaverde, R., 1974. Seismic risk, design spectra and
structural reliability, i n Proc. Ph World Conf. on Earthyuake
Engineering, pp. 2586-2597, Rome, Italy.
J oyner, W. B. & Boore, D.M., 1988. Measurement, characteriza-
tion, and prediction of strong ground motion, in Proc. ConJ on
Earthquake Engineering and Soil Dynamics 11 Recent
Advances in Ground-Motion evaluation, pp. 43-102, ed. Von
Thun, J .L., Geotechnical Special Publication No. 20, American
Society of Civil Engineers, New York.
Kanamori, H.. 1977. The energy release in great earthquakes, J .
geophys. Res. , 82, 2981-2987.
Ordaz, M. & Singh, S.K., 1992. Source spectral and spectral
attenuation of seismic waves from Mexican earthquakes, and
evidence of amplification in the hill zone of Mexico City, Bull.
seism. SOC. Am. 82, 24-43.
Singh, S.K., Lermo, J ., Dominguez, T., Ordaz, M., Espinosa,
J .M., Mena, E. & Quaas, R., 1988. A study of amplification of
seismic waves in the Valley of Mexico with respect to a
hill-zone site, Earthq. Spectra, 4, 653-674.
Singh, S.K., Ordaz. M., Anderson, J .G., Rodriguez, M., Quaas,
R., Mena, E., Ottaviani, M. & Almora, D., 1989. Analysis of
near-source string motion recordings along the Mexican
subduction zone, Bull. seism. Soc. Am. , 79, 1697-1717.
Veneziano, D. & Heidari, M., 1985. Statistical analysis of
attenuation in the eastern United States, in Methods of
Earthquake Ground-Motion Estimation for the Eastern United
States, EPRI Research Project RP2556-16, Palo Alto, CA.
1481- 1503.

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Bayesian attenuation regressions 343
Hence, if E( u) and VAR(u) are known, simultaneous
solution of eqs (A8) and (A10) yields the corresponding
values of r' and A'.
The marginal distribution of a can be obtained by
integration of eq. (A5):
APPENDIX A: THEORY
Consider the linear model of eq. (6) and the vector of
observed values of I nA y =(In A , , In A,, . . . , In A, )T. The
vector of observed errors, E = ( E ~ , E , , . . . , can be
written as
E =y - X a ,
( Al l
where a =(a,,, a', a,, aj)T is the vector of unknown
coefficients of the linear model and
/ 1 MI I nR1 R, \
1
. .
Mz InR, 'Iz
\ 1 M, InR, R, /
is the matrix of observed values of the non-random variables
M and R. Under the assumption of the random error E
being normally distributed with zero mean and variance u2,
the likelihood of n independent observations of E is
Of
h
L( E I a, h ) =~2 exp [ - 5 ( y - Xa)T(y - x a ) ]
('44)
where h =l/u2. The natural conjugate prior density
function, p ( a, h) , associated with this likelihood is the
normal-gamma (Broemling 1985):
P(aJ h ) =p( a I hlP(h), (-45)
where
p ( a I h ) =K,hkl2 exp c z " - - ( a - a')TR'(a - a') ]
('46)
and
p ( h ) =K,,h"-' exp (-A'h).
(A7)
In eqs (A6) and (A7), K, and K, are normalization
constants and k is the dimension of a, 4 in our case. I t can
be noted from eq. (A6) that, conditioned on h, a has a
k-variate normal joint distribution with E( a 1 h ) =a' and
COV( a) h) =( hR' ) - ' , where E( ) and COV( ) denote,
respectively, expected value and matrix of covariances; R' is
a known, symmetric, and positive definite matrix of order k ,
and a' is a k-dimensional vector. Eq. (A7) implies that h is
gamma-distributed with parameters r' and A' such that
E( h) =r'/k' and c2( h) =l / r' , where c ( ) denotes coefficient
of variation. It can be shown that
kt
r ' - 1 '
E(a2) =E( h- ' ) -
where r( ) is the gamma function (Davis 1972). From eqs
(A8) and (A9), an expression for the variance of u,
VAR(u) can be found:
where K, is a normalization constant. This function is a
k-variate Student's t density with 2r' degrees of freedom,
E(a) =a' , and precision matrix r' R' / A' , which implies that
Bayes' theorem states that
p( a, h I E ) ap ( a, ~ ) L ( E 1 a, h) .
(A14)
Replacing eqs (A4)-(A7) in eq., (A14), it is found that
(A151
which is also a normal-gamma distribution for a and h, with
r" =r' +n/2, R" =R' +X' r X, and
The predictive density function of y, given E and a new set
of non-random variables zT= (1, M,,, I, In R, , +, , R, , +' ) , is
the distribution of y given parameters a and h, averaged
with respect to the posterior distribution p( a, h 1 t):
Xp( a, h 1 E ) da, . . . da,, dh.
(A18)
From eq. (A18) is found that y has a Student's t
distribution with 2r" degrees of freedom and
A"
VAR(y I E , Z) =____
(r" - 1)d '
where
d =1 - Z"( R +zz' )-' z.
Note that VAR(y 1 E, z) includes the uncertainty due to
randomness (measured with h or (I, that is, with r" and A")
and the uncertainties in the unknown parameters of the
linear model (measured with coefficient d) .

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344 M. Ordaz, S . K. Singh and A. Arciniega
APPENDIX B: SYNTHETI C EXAMPLE
Consider the attenuation model of eq. (6):
In A =a,, +a, M +a2 In R +a,R +6,
(B1)
where E is a normally distributed random error with zero
mean and variance u2. We fixed q , = O , a, =0.8,
a2= -1.0, and a3= -0.005 and generated a random
sample of 1000 values of M, R and InA. The range of
magnitudes is reasonably broad (4-7) but the range of
distances is narrow (200-350 km), to try to reproduce the
case of subduction earthquakes that affect Mexico City. We
then selected prior expected values for a;, i =0, . . . , 3,
which are far from the real ones: E( ao) =5, E( a, ) =2. 0,
,!?(a2) =-0.5 and E( a3) =-0.01 (twice as large as the real
one, but at least negative, as we know from theory it should
be). We assigned very flat distributions to these prior values,
that is, we assigned them very large prior standard
deviations, implying that we do not feel very confident
about their prior expected values: SD(a,,) =5, SD( a, ) =2,
SD( a2) =1, and SD(cr3) =0.01. This means, for instance,
that we believe a priori that, with high probability, aj would
fall in the range -0.01(f)0.01 =(0, -0.02). Note that our
prior knowledge about the as is very vague. We applied
both the bayesian (BAY) and the least-squares (LS)
regression techniques to the same data set. First to the first
10 samples, then SO, and so on, up to 1000, trying to
reproduce the process of data gathering with time. The
corresponding estimators for the as are given in Table B1.
Table B1. Least-squares (LS) and bayesian (BAY) solutions for the
simulated example.
N 10
uo LS -19.17
BAY 1.734
a, LS 0.768
BAY 0.715
u2 LS 3.342
BAY -1.065
a, LS -0.024
BAY -0.009
u LS 0.530
BAY 0.687
so 100
57.59 -2.77
1.075 0.904
0.832 0.826
0.839 0.827
-13.72 -0.326
-1.126 -1.109
0.045 -0.009
-0.007 -0.007
0.659 0.729
0.694 0.741
500
-8 23
0 212
0 830
0 829
0 767
-1 094
-0 012
-0 004
0 715
0 719
loo0 Real
-14 7 0000
-0 094
0811 0 800
0 812
2244 -loo0
-1 028
-0 010 -0 00.5
-0 004
0 690 0 700
0 692
Note that even with N =1000, the LS approach is unable
to get the correct values of the as, with the exception of a, .
Results for several sample sizes with the LS approach are
unstable. It turns out, after observing 1000 values, that InA
grows as R2. Even when D is well predicted, and the
solution minimizes the standard error, the LS attenuation
relation is unacceptable.
On the other hand, the bayesian solution converges to the
correct values, even when all the prior values are wrong.
After not many observations, the weight of the empirical
evidence corrects the initial mistakes. The bayesian
procedure finds a solution that is not the one of minimum
standard error, but is very close, and leads to final estimates
that are physically reasonable. As we have shown in this
example, possible initial errors are rapidly corrected by
empirical evidence, so they do not go unrecognized.

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