Instrumental variable methods for causal inference

A goal of many health studies is to determine the causal effect of a treatment or intervention on health outcomes. Often, it is not ethically or practically possible to conduct a perfectly randomized experiment, and instead, an observational study must be used. A major challenge to the validity of observational studies is the possibility of unmeasured confounding (i.e., unmeasured ways in which the treatment and control groups differ before treatment administration, which also affect the outcome). Instrumental variables analysis is a method for controlling for unmeasured confounding. This type of analysis requires the measurement of a valid instrumental variable, which is a variable that (i) is independent of…

• NS
  National Science Foundation

  Award: SES-1260782
• NI
  National Institute of Mental Health

  Award: RC4MH092722
• NI
  National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research

  Award: U54DE019285