The time-dependent angular distributions of decays of neutral $B$ mesons into two vector mesons contain information about the lifetimes, mass differences, strong and weak phases, form factors, and $\mathrm{CP}$ violating quantities. A statistical analysis of the information content is performed by giving the “information” a quantitative meaning. It is shown that for some parameters of interest, the information content in time and angular measurements combined may be orders of magnitude more than the information from time measurements alone and hence angular measurements are highly recommended. The method of angular moments is compared with the (maximum) likelihood method to find that it works almost as well in the region of interest for the one-angle distribution. For the complete three-angle distribution, an estimate of possible statistical errors expected on the observables of interest is obtained. It indicates that the three-angle distribution, unraveled by the method of angular moments, would be able to nail down many quantities of interest and will help in pointing unambiguously to new physics.

• Received 21 October 1998

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevD.59.074002