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Semiparametric Estimation of Treatment Effects in Randomized Experiments

Susan Athey, Peter J. Bickel, Aiyou Chen, Guido W. Imbens, Michael Pollmann

arXiv 6 Sep 2021 · Statistics — Methodology · 5 citations (OpenAlex)

arXiv:2109.02603 · PDF · DOI · OpenAlex · Extracted main text

Abstract

We develop new semiparametric methods for estimating treatment effects. We focus on settings where the outcome distributions may be thick tailed, where treatment effects may be small, where sample sizes are large and where assignment is completely random. This setting is of particular interest in recent online experimentation. We propose using parametric models for the treatment effects, leading to semiparametric models for the outcome distributions. We derive the semiparametric efficiency bound for the treatment effects for this setting, and propose efficient estimators. In the leading case with constant quantile treatment effects one of the proposed efficient estimators has an interesting interpretation as a weighted average of quantile treatment effects, with the weights proportional to minus the second derivative of the log of the density of the potential outcomes. Our analysis also suggests an extension of Huber's model and trimmed mean to include asymmetry.

Citation extraction

56
references
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in-text mentions
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distinct cited
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main-text words

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Most heavily cited references

The works this paper leans on most, across its whole bibliography — not restricted to papers in our corpus. Ranked by composite intensity, which combines how often a work is mentioned, how many sections mention it, and how much of that falls in the main text rather than the appendix.

ReferenceIntensityMentionsSectionsMain text
1Jaeckel, L. A (1971) Some flexible estimates of location0.87472100%
2Csorgo, M. and P. Revesz (1978) Strong approximations of the quantile process0.84333100%
3Klaassen, C. A (1987) Consistent estimation of the influence function of locally asymptotically linear estimators0.84333100%
4Koenecke, A., M. Powell, R. Xiong, Z. Shen, N. Fischer, S. Huq, A. M… (2021) Alpha-1 adrenergic receptor antagonists to prevent hyperinflammation and death from lower respiratory tract infection0.81142100%
5Bickel, P. J., C. A. Klaassen, Y. Ritov, and J. A. Wellner (1993) Efficient and adaptive estimation for semiparametric models, Volume 4 self0.73732100%
6Chernoff, H., J. L. Gastwirth, and M. V. Johns (1967) Asymptotic distribution of linear combinations of functions of order statistics with applications to estimation0.73732100%
Bickelunmatched citation key Bickel0.64441100%
Bickel and Lehmannunmatched citation key Bickel and Lehmann0.64441100%
9Jaeckel, L. A (1971) Robust estimates of location: Symmetry and asymmetric contamination0.64441100%
10Bickel, P. J (1967) Some contributions to the theory of order statistics self0.64422100%

Showing the top 10 of 157 scored citations. 2 of these could not be matched to a bibliography entry, so only the citation key is shown.

Cited by, within the corpus

arXiv econ.EM papers that cite this one, ranked by how heavily they lean on it.

Citing paperIntensityMentionsSections
1Logs with zeros? Some problems and solutions0.51121
2a framework for generalization and transportation of causal estimates under covariate shift0.40511