Abstract—Recently there has been a surge in econometric work focusing on estimating average treatment effects under various sets of assumptions. One strand of this literature has developed methods for estimating average treatment effects for a binary treatment under assumptions variously described as exogeneity, unconfoundedness, or selection on observables. The implication of these assumptions is that systematic (for example, average or distributional) differences in outcomes between treated and control units with the same values for the covariates are attributable to the treatment. Recent analysis has considered estimation and inference for average treatment effects under weaker assumptions than typical of the earlier literature by avoiding distributional and functional-form assumptions. Various methods of semiparametric estimation have been proposed, including estimating the unknown regression functions, matching, methods using the propensity score such as weighting and blocking, and combinations of these approaches. In this paper I review the state of this

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This paper studies the causal interpretation of counterfactual sentences using a modifiable structural equation model. It is shown that two properties of counterfactuals, namely, composition and effectiveness, are sound and complete relative to this interpretation, when recursive (i.e., feedback-less) models are considered. Composition and effectiveness also hold in Lewis's closest-world semantics, which implies that for recursive models the causal interpretation imposes no restrictions beyond those embodied in Lewis's framework. A third property, called reversibility, holds in nonrecursive causal models but not in Lewis's closest-world semantics, which implies that Lewis's axioms do not capture some properties of systems with feedback. Causal inferences based on counterfactual analysis are exemplified and compared to those based on graphical models.

This paper builds on the structural equations, treatment effect, and machine learning literatures to provide a causal framework that permits the identification and estimation of causal effects from observational studies. We begin by providing a causal interpretation for standard exogenous regressors and standard “valid” and “relevant” instrumental variables. We then build on this interpretation to characterize extended instrumental variables (EIV) methods, that is methods that make use of variables that need not be valid instruments in the standard sense, but that are nevertheless instrumental in the recovery of causal effects of interest. After examining special cases of single and double EIV methods, we provide necessary and sufficient conditions for the identification of causal effects by means of EIV and provide consistent and asymptotically normal estimators for the effects of interest.

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this paper I (1) examine three levels of inferential strength supported by typical social science data-gathering methods, and call for a greater degree of explicitness, when HMs and other models are applied, in identifying which level is appropriate; (2) reconsider the use of HMs in school effectiveness studies and meta-analysis from the perspective of causal inference; and (3) recommend the increased use of Gibbs sampling and other Markov-chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods in the application of HMs in the social sciences, so that comparisons between MCMC and better-established fitting methods---including full or restricted maximum likelihood estimation based on the EM algorithm, Fisher scoring or iterative generalized least squares---may be more fully informed by empirical practice.

In this article we develop the theoretical properties of the propensity function, which is a generalization of the propensity score of Rosenbaum and Rubin. Methods based on the propensity score have long been used for causal inference in observational studies; they are easy to use and can effectively reduce the bias caused by nonrandom treatment assignment. Although treatment regimes need not be binary in practice, the propensity score methods are generally confined to binary treatment scenarios. Two possible exceptions have been suggested for ordinal and categorical treatments. In this article we develop theory and methods that encompass all of these techniques and widen their applicability by allowing for arbitrary treatment regimes. We illustrate our propensity function methods by applying them to two datasets; we estimate the effect of smoking on medical expenditure and the effect of schooling on wages. We also conduct simulation studies to investigate the performance of our methods.

We formulate the problem of learning and comparing the effects of dynamic treatment strategies in a probabilistic decision-theoretic framework, and in particular show how Robins’s “G-computation ” formula arises naturally. Careful attention is paid to the mathematical and substantive conditions necessary to justify use of this formula. Probabilistic influence diagrams are used to simplify manipulations. We compare our approach with formulations based on causal DAGs and on potential response models. Some key words and phrases: Causal inference; G-computation; Influence diagram; Observational study; Potential response; Sequential decision theory; Stability. 1

Recent advances in statistical software have led to the rapid diffusion of new methods for modeling longitudinal data. Multilevel (also known as hierarchical or random effects) models for binary outcomes have been generally based on a logistic-normal specification, by analogy with earlier work for normally distributed data. The appropriate application and interpretation of these models remains somewhat unclear, especially when compared with the computationally more straightforward marginal modeling (GEE) approaches. In this paper we pose two interrelated questions. First, what limits should be placed on the interpretation of the coefficients and inferences derived from random effect models involving binary outcomes? Second, what are the minimum diagnostic checks that are required to evaluate whether such random effect models provide appropriate fits to the data? We address these questions by means of an extended case study using data on adolescent smoking from a large cohort study. Bay...

This paper unifies three complementary approaches to defining, identifying, and estimating causal effects: the classical structural equations approach of the Cowles Commision; the treatment effects framework of Rubin (1974) and Rosenbaum and Rubin (1983); and the Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) approach of Pearl. The settable system framework nests these prior approaches, while affording significant improvements to each. For example, the settable system approach permits identification of causal effects without requiring exogenous instruments; instead, a weaker conditional exogeneity condition suffices. It removes the stable unit treatment value assumption of the treatment effect approach and provides significant insight into the selection of covariates. It generalizes the DAG ap-proach by accommodating mutual causality and attributes. We provide a variety of results ensuring structural identification of general covariate-conditioned average causal effects, laying the founda-tion for parametric and nonparametric estimation of effects of interest and new tests for structural identification.