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Michael Jetsupphasuk

Publications and source records attributed to Michael Jetsupphasuk.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

Difference-in-differences with stochastic policy shifts of a continuous treatment

Treatment effects of stochastic policy shifts quantify differences in outcomes across counterfactual scenarios with varying treatment distributions. Stochastic policy shifts may be of interest in settings where it is unrealistic or infeasible to deterministically manipulate treatments. In this paper, methods are developed to draw inference about stochastic policy effects under difference-in-differences (DiD) designs with a continuous treatment. The proposed causal estimand is the expected effect of modifying the continuous dose distribution among the treated, i.e., those that received a non-zero dose. Several possible stochastic policies are discussed and a general framework for identification and estimation is proposed. One stochastic policy applicable to many settings is the exponential tilt, which increments the conditional density function of the continuous dose. For the exponential tilt policy, a double/debiased machine learning estimator is proposed that allows for data-adaptive, nonparametric nuisance function estimation. Under mild convergence rate conditions, the estimator is shown to be root-$n$ consistent and asymptotically normal with variance attaining the nonparametric efficiency bound. The proposed method is used to study the effect of hydraulic fracturing activity on employment and income.

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Efficient nonparametric estimation with difference-in-differences in the presence of network dependence and interference

Differences-in-differences (DiD) is a causal inference method for observational longitudinal data that assumes parallel expected potential outcome trajectories between treatment groups under the counterfactual scenario where all units receive a specific treatment. In this paper DiD is extended to allow for: (i) non-identically distributed treatment effects and exposure probabilities; (ii) interference, where treatment of one unit can affect outcomes in neighboring units; and (iii) latent variable dependence, where outcomes, treatments, and covariates may exhibit between-unit correlation. The causal estimand of interest is the network-averaged expected exposure effect if units received a specific exposure level, where a unit's exposure is a function of its own treatment and its neighbors' treatments. Under a conditional parallel trends assumption and suitable network dependency and heterogeneity conditions, a doubly robust estimator allowing for data-adaptive nuisance function estimation is proposed and shown to be consistent, asymptotically normal, and efficient. The proposed methods are evaluated in simulations and applied to study the effects of adopting emission control technologies in coal power plants on county-level mortality due to cardiovascular disease.

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Finite sample performance of optimal treatment rule estimators with right-censored outcomes

Patient care may be improved by recommending treatments based on patient characteristics when there is treatment effect heterogeneity. Recently, there has been a great deal of attention focused on the estimation of optimal treatment rules that maximize expected outcomes. However, there has been comparatively less attention given to settings where the outcome is right-censored, especially with regard to the practical use of estimators. In this study, simulations were undertaken to assess the finite-sample performance of estimators for optimal treatment rules and estimators for the expected outcome under treatment rules. The simulations were motivated by the common setting in biomedical and public health research where the data is observational, survival times may be right-censored, and there is interest in estimating baseline treatment decisions to maximize survival probability. A variety of outcome regression and direct search estimation methods were compared for optimal treatment rule estimation across a range of simulation scenarios. Methods that flexibly model the outcome performed comparatively well, including in settings where the treatment rule was non-linear. R code to reproduce this study's results are available on Github.

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Causal Inference in Longitudinal Data under Unknown Interference

In longitudinal studies where units are embedded in space or a social network, interference may arise, meaning that a unit's outcome can depend on treatment histories of others. The presence of interference poses significant challenges for causal inference, particularly when the interference structure -- how a unit's outcome responds to others' influences -- is complex, heterogeneous, and unknown to researchers. This paper develops a general framework for identifying and estimating both direct and spillover effects of treatment histories under minimal assumptions about the interference structure. We introduce a class of causal estimands that capture the effects of treatment histories at any specified proximity level and show that they can be represented by a modified marginal structural model. Under sequential exchangeability, these estimands are identifiable and can be estimated using inverse probability weighting. We derive conditions for consistency and asymptotic normality of the estimators and provide procedures for constructing asymptotically conservative confidence intervals. The method's utility is demonstrated through applications in both social science and biomedical settings.

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