The covariance of causal effect estimators for binary v-structures

Jack Kuipers; Giusi Moffa

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arXiv · 2503.14242

The covariance of causal effect estimators for binary v-structures

Jack Kuipers·Giusi Moffa

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Abstract

Previously [Journal of Causal Inference, 10, 90-105 (2022)], we computed the variance of two estimators of causal effects for a v-structure of binary variables. Here we show that a linear combination of these estimators has lower variance than either. Furthermore, we show that this holds also when the treatment variable is block randomised with a predefined number receiving treatment, with analogous results to when it is sampled randomly.

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Jack Kuipers, Giusi Moffa. 2025-03-18. The covariance of causal effect estimators for binary v-structures. https://arxiv.org/abs/2503.14242

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