An impulse response function describes the dynamic evolution of an outcome variable following a stimulus or treatment. A common hypothesis of interest is whether the treatment affects the outcome. We show that this hypothesis is best assessed using significance bands rather than relying on commonly displayed confidence bands. Under the null hypothesis, we show that significance bands are trivial to construct with standard statistical software using the LM principle, and should be reported as a matter of routine when displaying impulse responses graphically.

翻译：脉冲响应函数描述了结果变量在刺激或处理后的动态演变过程。一个常见的关注假设是处理是否影响结果。我们表明，这一假设最好通过显著性带进行评估，而非依赖通常展示的置信带。在原假设下，我们证明利用LM原则，使用标准统计软件构建显著性带非常简单，并且在进行脉冲响应图形展示时应作为常规内容予以报告。