每日简报

定性结局的因果推断AI 解读

Causal inference methods such as instrumental variables, regression discontinuity, and difference-in-differences are widely used to identify and estimate treatment effects. However, when outcomes are qualitative, their application poses fundamental challenges. This paper highlights these challenges and proposes an alternative framework that focuses on well-defined and interpretable estimands. We show that conventional identification assumptions suffice for identifying the…

纵向数据中右删失工资的插补策略AI 解读

Censoring from above is a common problem with wage information as the reported wages are typically top-coded for confidentiality reasons. In administrative databases the information is often collected only up to a pre-specified threshold, for example, the contribution limit for the social security system. While directly accounting for the censoring is possible for some analyses, the most flexible solution is to impute the values above the censoring point. This strategy…

用平衡权重整合随机试验与外部对照数据：估计目标与估计量比较AI 解读

Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) face inherent limitations, such as ethical or resource constraints, which lead to a limited number of study participants. To address these limitations, recent research endeavors have sought to incorporate external control (EC) data, such as historical trial data or real-world data, with RCT data in treatment effect evaluation. This integration introduces unique questions regarding target population specification, causal estimand, and…

离线逆强化学习与动态离散选择模型的经验风险最小化方法AI 解读

We study the problem of estimating Dynamic Discrete Choice (DDC) models, also known as offline Maximum Entropy-Regularized Inverse Reinforcement Learning (offline MaxEnt-IRL) in machine learning. The objective is to recover reward or $Q^*$ functions that govern agent behavior from offline behavior data. In this paper, we propose a globally convergent gradient-based method for solving these problems without the restrictive assumption of linearly parameterized rewards. The…

处理分配存在干扰时直接平均处理效应的稳健推断AI 解读

This paper develops methods for uncertainty quantification in causal inference settings with random network interference. We study the large-sample distributional properties of the classical difference-in-means Hajek treatment effect estimator, and propose a robust inference procedure for the (conditional) direct average treatment effect. Our framework allows for cross-unit interference in both the outcome equation and the treatment assignment mechanism. Drawing from…

对照始终不可观测时的时间序列处理效应分析AI 解读

Estimating treatment effects in time series data presents a significant challenge, especially when the control group is always unobservable. For example, in analyzing the effects of Christmas on retail sales, we lack direct observation of what would have occurred in late December without the Christmas impact. To address this, we try to recover the control group in the event period while accounting for confounders and temporal dependencies. Experimental results on the M5…

通过尺度参数发现重尾线性结构方程模型中的因果关系AI 解读

Causal dependence modelling of multivariate extremes is intended to improve our understanding of the relationships amongst variables associated with rare events. Regular variation provides a standard framework in the study of extremes. This paper concerns the linear structural equation model with regularly varying noise variables. We focus on extreme observations generated from such a model and propose a causal discovery method based on the scaling parameters of its extremal…

局部稳健政策学习：不平等、机会不平等与代际流动AI 解读

Policy makers need to decide whether to treat or not to treat heterogeneous individuals. The optimal treatment choice depends on the welfare function that the policy maker has in mind and it is referred to as the policy learning problem. I study a general setting for policy learning with semiparametric Social Welfare Functions (SWFs) that can be estimated by locally robust/orthogonal moments based on U-statistics. This rich class of SWFs substantially expands the setting in…

孟德尔随机化中的异常工具变量检测AI 解读

Mendelian Randomisation (MR) uses genetic variants as instrumental variables to infer causal effects of exposures on an outcome. One key assumption of MR is that the genetic variants used as instrumental variables are independent of the outcome conditional on the risk factor and unobserved confounders. Violations of this assumption, i.e. the effect of the instrumental variables on the outcome through a path other than the risk factor included in the model (which can be…

极端协变量下的二元结果模型：估计与预测AI 解读

This paper presents a novel semiparametric method to study the effects of extreme events on binary outcomes and subsequently forecast future outcomes. Our approach, based on Bayes' theorem and regularly varying (RV) functions, facilitates a Pareto approximation in the tail without imposing parametric assumptions beyond the tail. We analyze cross-sectional as well as static and dynamic panel data models, incorporate additional covariates, and accommodate the unobserved…

随机实验协变量平衡的高斯化设计优化AI 解读

Achieving covariate balance in randomized experiments enhances the precision of treatment effect estimation. However, existing methods often require heuristic adjustments based on domain knowledge and are primarily developed for binary treatments. This paper presents Gaussianized Design Optimization, a novel framework for optimally balancing covariates in experimental design. The core idea is to Gaussianize the treatment assignments: we model treatments as transformations of…

条件三重差分法AI 解读

Triple difference-in-differences designs are widely used to estimate causal effects in empirical work. Surveying the literature, we find that most applications include controls. We show that this standard practice is generally biased for the target causal estimand when covariate distributions differ across groups. To address this, we propose identifying a causal estimand by fixing the covariate distribution to that of one group. We then develop a double-robust estimator and…

积分方程解的线性泛函置信集合的渐近有效性AI 解读

This paper examines the construction of confidence sets for parameters defined as linear functionals of a function of W and X whose conditional mean given Z and X equals the conditional mean of another variable Y given Z and X. Many estimands of interest in causal inference can be expressed in this form, including the average treatment effect in proximal causal inference and treatment effect contrasts in instrumental variable models. We derive a necessary condition for a…

远期因果偏离效应：微随机试验中时变处理的长期效应建模AI 解读

Micro-randomized trials (MRTs) play a crucial role in optimizing digital interventions. In an MRT, each participant is sequentially randomized among treatment options hundreds of times. While the interventions tested in MRTs target short-term behavioral responses (proximal outcomes), their ultimate goal is to drive long-term behavior change (distal outcomes). However, existing causal inference methods, such as the causal excursion effect, are limited to proximal outcomes,…

正值性违反下连续处理的可行剂量反应曲线AI 解读

Positivity violations can complicate estimation and interpretation of causal dose-response curves (CDRCs) for continuous interventions. Weighting-based methods are designed to handle limited overlap, but the resulting weighted targets can be hard to interpret scientifically. Modified treatment policies can be less sensitive to support limitations, yet they typically target policy-defined effects that may not align with the original dose-response question. We develop an…

函数型面板数据的动态网络自回归模型AI 解读

This study proposes a novel functional dynamic network autoregressive framework for analyzing network and dynamic interactions of functional outcomes in panel data settings. In this framework, an individual's outcome function is influenced by his/her previous outcome and the outcomes of others through a simultaneous equation system. To estimate the functional parameters of interest, we need to cope with the endogeneity issue arising from these interactions among outcome…

基于核岭回归的条件平均处理效应迁移学习AI 解读

The proliferation of data has sparked significant interest in leveraging findings from one study to estimate treatment effects in a different target population without direct outcome observations. However, the transfer learning process is frequently hindered by substantial covariate shift and limited overlap between (i) the source and target populations, as well as (ii) the treatment and control groups within the source. We propose a novel method for overlap-adaptive…

序贯决策、自适应实验与批次赌博机的渐近表示AI 解读

We develop asymptotic approximations that can be applied to sequential estimation and inference problems, adaptive randomized controlled trials, and related settings. In batched adaptive settings where the decision at one stage can affect the observation of variables in later stages, our asymptotic representation characterizes all limit distributions attainable through a joint choice of an adaptive design rule and statistics applied to the adaptively generated data. This…

不完备偏好的识别AI 解读

We provide a sharp identification region for discrete choice models where consumers' preferences are not necessarily complete even if only aggregate choice data is available. Behavior is modeled using an upper and a lower utility for each alternative so that non-comparability can arise. The identification region places intuitive bounds on the probability distribution of upper and lower utilities. We show that the existence of an instrumental variable can be used to reject…

处理时变混杂的灵活贝叶斯生存分析 g 公式AI 解读

In longitudinal observational studies with time-to-event outcomes, a common objective in causal analysis is to estimate the causal survival curve under hypothetical intervention scenarios. The g-formula is a useful tool for this analysis. To enhance the traditional parametric g-formula, we developed an alternative g-formula estimator, which incorporates the Bayesian Additive Regression Trees (BART) into the modeling of the time-evolving generative components, aiming to…

关于处理效应异质性序贯验证与随机实验机器学习推断评论的回应AI 解读

We warmly thank Kosuke Imai, Michael Lingzhi Li, and Stefan Wager for their gracious and insightful comments. We are particularly encouraged that both pieces recognize the importance of the research agenda the lecture laid out, which we see as critical for applied researchers. It is also great to see that both underscore the potential of the basic approach we propose - targeting summary features of the CATE after proxy estimation with sample splitting. We are also happy that…

网络干扰下的因果推断：回归调整与最优性AI 解读

In randomized controlled trials without interference, regression adjustment is widely used to enhance the efficiency of treatment effect estimation. This paper extends this efficiency principle to settings with network interference, where a unit's response may depend on the treatments assigned to its neighbors in a network. We make three key contributions: (1) we establish a central limit theorem for a linear regression-adjusted estimator and prove its optimality in…

协变量自适应随机化下的多回归变量调整AI 解读

Our paper discovers a new trade-off of using regression adjustments (RAs) in causal inference under covariate-adaptive randomizations (CARs). On one hand, RAs can improve the efficiency of causal estimators by incorporating information from covariates that are not used in the randomization. On the other hand, RAs can degrade estimation efficiency due to their estimation errors, which are not asymptotically negligible when the number of regressors is of the same order as the…

对不平等敏感的最优处理分配AI 解读

The egalitarian equivalent, $ee$, of a societal distribution of outcomes with mean $m$ is the outcome level such that the evaluator is indifferent between the distribution of outcomes and a society in which everyone obtains an outcome of $ee$. For an inequality averse evaluator, $ee < m$. In this paper, I extend the optimal treatment choice framework in Manski (2024) to the case where the welfare evaluation is made using egalitarian equivalent measures, and derive optimal…