A Combinatorial Central Limit Theorem

Abstract

Let $(Y_{n1}, \cdots, Y_{nn})$ be a random vector which takes on the $n!$ permutations of $(1, \cdots, n)$ with equal probabilities. Let $c_n(i, j), i,j = 1, \cdots, n,$ be $n^2$ real numbers. Sufficient conditions for the asymptotic normality of $S_n = \sum^n_{i=1} c_n(i, Y_{ni})$ are given (Theorem 3). For the special case $c_n(i,j) = a_n(i)b_n(j)$ a stronger version of a theorem of Wald, Wolfowitz and Noether is obtained (Theorem 4). A condition of Noether is simplified (Theorem 1).