ARPobservation provides a set of tools for simulating the sort of data generated during direct observation of a behavior over time. It works by first simulating a behavior stream based on an alternating renewal process, given specified distributions of event durations and interim times. The following distributions are currently supported:
- Exponential
- Gamma with fixed shape parameter
- Mixture of two gammas
- Weibull with fixed shape parameter
- Uniform(0,x)
- Constant (degenerate)
Different methods of recording data can then be applied to the simulated behavior stream. Functions are provided for the following recording methods:
- continuous duration recording
- event counting
- momentary time sampling
- partial interval recording
- whole interval recording