Causal Inference Working Group

This group is comprised of a multi-disciplinary group of students and faculty from Johns Hopkins University, who are interested in the application and development of statistical methods for drawing causal inferences about intervention effects from partially-controlled studies. The group meets alternate Thursdays from 12-1:30.  Please contact Daniel Scharfstein at dscharf@jhsph.edu.

Schedule

Papers

Angrist JD, Imbens GW, and Rubin DB (1996) Identification of Causal Effects Using Instrumental Variables (with discussion).  JASA, 91, 444-472.

             Discussion:  Robins JM and Greenland S, Heckman JJ, Moffitt RA, Rosenbaum PR and Rejoinder

Angrist J and Lavy V. (1999) Using Maimonides rule to estimate the effect of class size on scholastic achievement. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 114: 533-75.

Dawid P (2000) Causal Inference without Counterfactuals (with discussion).  JASA, 95, 407 - 447.

Hirano K  and Imbens GW (2004)  The Propensity Score with Continuous Treatments

Holland PW (1986) Statistics and Causal Inference (with discussion), JASA 1986, 81, 945-970.

            Discussion:  Rubin DB, Cox DR, Glymour C, Granger C and Rejoinder

McCullagh, P (2004) Exchangeability and regression models

Neyman J, Dabrowska DM and Speed TP (1990) On the Application of Probability Theory to Agricultural Experiments (with discussion). Statistical Science, 5, 465-472

            Discussion: Rubin DB (1990) Neyman (1923) and Causal Inference in Experiments and Observational Studies

Robins JM (2001) Data, Design, and Background Knowledge in Etiologic Inference. Epidemiology, 11, 313-320.

Rubin DB (1974) Estimating Causal Effects of Treatments in Randomized and Non-randomized Studies Journal of Educational Psychology, 66, 688- 701.

Rubin DB (1978) Bayesian Inference for Causal Effects:  The Role of Randomization.  Annals of Statistics, 6, 34-58.

Van der Klaauw W (2002)  Estimating the effect of financial aid offers on college enrollment: A regression-discontinuity approach. International Economic Review, 43(4): 1249-87.

Vytacil (2002) Independence, Montonicity, and Latent Index Models: An Equivalence Result Econometrica 70, 331-341.

Philosophy References

    Aristotle

    Hardie RP and Gayle RK Physics  in Introduction to Aristotle (edited by McKeon R)

    Hume

      There are essentially two primary works of relevance (to causality) by Hume: (a) A Treatise on Human Nature (commonly referred to as "the treatise"), and  (b) An Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding (commonly referred to as "the Inquiry"). In addition, Hume also wrote an "Abstract" under a pseudonym (the abstract is sometimes mistakenly attributed to John Adam Smith, the famous economist, who was a close friend of Hume), which was supposed to lay out for the "lay" audience a simple summary of the arguments presented in the inquiry. Any one interested in causality, in particular, should read the "Abstract" and the following sections in the "Inquiry": Section II - Of the Origin of Ideas, Section III - Of the Association of Ideas, Section IV (parts I and II) - Skeptical Doubts Concerning the Operations of the Understanding, Section V (parts I and II) - Skeptical Solution of these Doubts, Section VI - Of Probability, and Section VII (parts I and II) - Of the Idea of Necessary Connection.  These readings can be found in: An Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, with a supplement, An Abstract of A Treatise of Human Nature. Edited with Introduction by Charles W. Hendel. Published by Prentice Hall (1995).