每日简报

竞争事件下因果问题与统计方法错位的影响：以治疗机制为关注点AI 解读

In the presence of competing events, many investigators are interested in a direct treatment effect on the event of interest that does not capture treatment effects on competing events. Classical survival analysis methods that treat competing events like censoring events, at best, target a controlled direct effect: the effect of the treatment under a difficult to imagine and typically clinically irrelevant scenario where competing events are somehow eliminated. A separable…

交叉验证因果推断：结合实验与观察数据的方法AI 解读

We develop new methods to integrate experimental and observational data in causal inference. While randomized controlled trials offer strong internal validity, they are often costly and therefore limited in sample size. Observational data, though cheaper and often with larger sample sizes, are prone to biases due to unmeasured confounders. To harness their complementary strengths, we propose a systematic framework that formulates causal estimation as an empirical risk…

高维非线性结果模型的残差平衡AI 解读

We extend the approximate residual balancing (ARB) framework to nonlinear models, answering an open problem posed by Athey et al. (2018). Our approach addresses the challenge of estimating average treatment effects in high-dimensional settings where the outcome follows a generalized linear model. We derive a new bias decomposition for nonlinear models that reveals the need for a second-order correction to account for the curvature of the link function. Based on this insight,…

基于随机化分布的稳健贝叶斯因果效应推断AI 解读

We present a general framework for Bayesian inference of causal effects that delivers provably robust inferences founded on design-based randomization of treatments. The framework involves fixing the observed potential outcomes and forming a likelihood based on the randomization distribution of a statistic. The method requires specification of a treatment effect model; in many cases, however, it does not require specification of marginal outcome distributions, resulting in…

动态空间处理效应与网络脆弱性：2008年金融危机的理论与证据AI 解读

The 2008 financial crisis exposed fundamental vulnerabilities in interconnected banking systems, yet existing frameworks fail to integrate spatial propagation with network contagion mechanisms. This paper develops a unified spatial-network framework to analyze systemic risk dynamics, revealing three critical findings that challenge conventional wisdom. First, banking consolidation paradoxically increased systemic fragility: while bank numbers declined 47.3% from 2007 to…

逆处理概率加权Kaplan–Meier估计量的方差估计AI 解读

In a widely cited paper, Xie and Liu (henceforth XL) proposed to use inverse probability of treatment weighting (IPTW) to account for possible confounding in observational studies with survival endpoints subject to right censoring. Their proposal includes an IPTW Kaplan-Meier (KM) estimator for the survival function of a treatment-specific potential failure time, which can be used to evaluate the causal effect of one treatment versus another. The IPTW KM estimator is…

连接政策学习中的经验福利最大化与条件平均处理效应估计AI 解读

The goal of policy learning is to train a policy function that recommends a treatment given covariates to maximize population welfare. There are two major approaches in policy learning: the empirical welfare maximization (EWM) approach and the plug-in approach. The EWM approach is analogous to a classification problem, where one first builds an estimator of the population welfare, which is a functional of policy functions, and then trains a policy by maximizing the estimated…

利用网络数据改进对不可观测因素的控制AI 解读

This paper develops a method to conduct causal inference in the presence of unobserved confounders by leveraging networks with homophily, a frequently observed tendency to form edges with similar nodes. I introduce a concept of asymptotic homophily, according to which individuals' selectivity scales with the size of the potential connection pool. The resulting network formation model accommodates common empirical features such as homophily, degree heterogeneity, sparsity,…

连接分层与回归调整：随机实验中的批次自适应分层与设计后调整AI 解读

To increase statistical efficiency in a randomized experiment, researchers often use stratification (i.e., blocking) in the design stage. However, conventional practices of stratification fail to exploit valuable information about the predictive relationship between covariates and potential outcomes. In this paper, I introduce an adaptive stratification procedure for increasing statistical efficiency when some information is available about the relationship between…

面板向量自回归的因果解释AI 解读

This paper discusses the different contemporaneous causal interpretations of Panel Vector Autoregressions (PVAR). I show that the interpretation of PVARs depends on the distribution of the causing variable, and can range from average treatment effects, to average causal responses, to a combination of the two. If the researcher is willing to postulate a no residual autocorrelation assumption, and some units can be thought of as controls, PVAR can identify average treatment…

Control VAR：基于反事实的宏观经济推断方法AI 解读

This paper addresses the challenges of giving a causal interpretation to vector autoregressions (VARs). I show that under independence assumptions VARs can identify average treatment effects, average causal responses, or a mix of the two, depending on the distribution of the policy. But what about situations in which the economist cannot rely on independence assumptions? I propose an alternative method, defined as control-VAR, which uses control variables to estimate causal…

具有随机生成群组的面板数据模型AI 解读

We develop a structural framework for modeling and inferring unobserved heterogeneity in dynamic panel-data models. Unlike methods treating clustering as a descriptive device, we model heterogeneity as arising from a latent clustering mechanism, where the number of clusters is unknown and estimated. Building on the mixture of finite mixtures (MFM) approach, our method avoids the clustering inconsistency issues of Dirichlet process mixtures and provides an interpretable…

最优处理分配下福利与价值泛函的推断AI 解读

We provide theoretical results for the estimation and inference of a class of welfare and value functionals of the nonparametric conditional average treatment effect (CATE) function under optimal treatment assignment, i.e., treatment is assigned to an observed type if and only if its CATE is nonnegative. For the optimal welfare functional defined as the average value of CATE on the subpopulation with nonnegative CATE, we establish the $\sqrt{n}$ asymptotic normality of the…

评估自适应风险预测模型临床影响的准实验设计AI 解读

Clinical risk prediction is a valuable tool for guiding healthcare interventions toward those most likely to benefit. Yet, evaluating the pairing of a risk prediction model with an intervention using randomized controlled trials presents substantial challenges, making quasi-experimental designs an attractive alternatives. Existing designs, however, assume that both the model and the decision rules used to trigger interventions (typically a risk threshold) remain fixed. This…

通过最小化 Bregman 散度实现直接去偏机器学习AI 解读

We develop a direct debiased machine learning framework comprising Neyman targeted estimation and generalized Riesz regression. Our framework unifies Riesz regression for automatic debiased machine learning, covariate balancing, targeted maximum likelihood estimation (TMLE), and density-ratio estimation. In many problems involving causal effects or structural models, the parameters of interest depend on regression functions. Plugging regression functions estimated by machine…

因果推断的统一理论：通过 Bregman-Riesz 回归实现直接去偏机器学习AI 解读

This note introduces a unified theory for causal inference that integrates Riesz regression, covariate balancing, density-ratio estimation (DRE), targeted maximum likelihood estimation (TMLE), and the matching estimator in average treatment effect (ATE) estimation. In ATE estimation, the balancing weights and the regression functions of the outcome play important roles, where the balancing weights are referred to as the Riesz representer, bias-correction term, and clever…

右删失持续时间模型的外生性检验AI 解读

Consider the setting in which a researcher is interested in the causal effect of a treatment $Z$ on a duration time $T$, which is subject to right censoring. We assume that $T=\varphi(X,Z,U)$, where $X$ is a vector of baseline covariates, $\varphi(X,Z,U)$ is strictly increasing in the error term $U$ for each $(X,Z)$ and $U\sim \mathcal{U}[0,1]$. Therefore, the model is nonparametric and nonseparable. We propose nonparametric tests for the hypothesis that $Z$ is exogenous,…

利用代理变量迁移因果效应AI 解读

We consider the problem of estimating a causal effect in a multi-domain setting. The causal effect of interest is confounded by an unobserved confounder and can change between the different domains. We assume that we have access to a proxy of the hidden confounder and that all variables are discrete or categorical. We propose methodology to estimate the causal effect in the target domain, where we assume to observe only the proxy variable. Under these conditions, we prove…

随机试验中疫苗效应的非参数界AI 解读

Vaccine randomized trials are typically designed to be blinded, ensuring that the estimated vaccine efficacy (VE) reflects the immunological effect of the vaccine. When blinding is broken, however, the estimated VE reflects not only the immunological effect but also behavioral effects stemming from participants' awareness of their treatment status. Recent work has proposed alternative causal estimands to the standard VE to address this issue, but their point identification…

基于群组匹配的因果推断AI 解读

This paper examines methods of causal inference based on groupwise matching when we observe multiple large groups of individuals over several periods. We formulate causal inference validity through a generalized matching condition, generalizing the parallel trend assumption in difference-in-differences designs. We show that difference-in-differences, synthetic control, and synthetic difference-in-differences designs are distinguished by the specific matching conditions that…

发现具有空间结构的时间序列之间的因果关系AI 解读

Causal discovery is the subfield of causal inference concerned with estimating the structure of cause-and-effect relationships in a system of interrelated variables, as opposed to quantifying the strength or describing the form of causal effects. As interest in causal discovery builds in fields such as ecology, public health, and environmental sciences where data are regularly collected with spatial and temporal structures, approaches must evolve to manage autocorrelation…

Large language models are increasingly used to classify text at scale. Because their outputs are stochastic, it is common to query a model several times per item and aggregate the results, and latent class models offer a principled way to convert such repeated ratings into estimates of outcome prevalence and of the model's error rates. These models assume that repeated ratings of the same item are conditionally independent given the true label. We examine this assumption…

检验双重差分平行趋势违背时的有效推断AI 解读

The difference-in-differences (DID) research design is a key identification strategy which allows researchers to estimate causal effects under the parallel trends assumption. While the parallel trends assumption is counterfactual and cannot be tested directly, researchers often examine pre-treatment periods to check whether the time trends are parallel before treatment is administered. A recent literature has shown that existing preliminary tests have adverse effects on…

稀疏双边互动模型中的互补性AI 解读

This paper studies complementarities in two-sided interaction models when only a sparse subset of potential matches is realized. I introduce the Tukey model, adding one complementarity parameter to two-way fixed effects. Variation within a four-cycle in the observed matching network identifies this parameter, while connectedness permits identification of agent productivities. I propose a cycle-based estimator that avoids estimating latent productivities. The estimator is…