Quantifying non-monotonicity of functions and the lack of positivity in signed measures (Q1686351)

Motivated by the problem of measuring lack of monotonicity of a function, being of some importance in insurance mathematics, the authors introduce a so-called lack of increase index (LOI) of (an absolutely continuous) function \(g:[a,b]\to\mathbb R\) as the negative variation of \(g\) on \([a,b]\) (the lack of decrease index, LOD, is defined analogously). Then they elaborate on (elementary) properties of total and negative/positive variation of a function. The measure-theoretic approach is also included.