How Large Must an Associational Mean Difference Be to Support a Causal Effect
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Contributors
Abstract
An observational study might support a causal claim if the association found cannot be explained by bias due to unconsidered confounders. This bias depends on how strongly the common predisposition, a summary of unconsidered confounders, is related to the factor and the outcome. For a positive effect to be supported, the product of these two relations must be smaller than the left boundary of the confidence interval for, e.g., a standardised mean difference (d). We suggest means to derive heuristics for how large this product must be to serve as a confirmatory threshold. We also provide non-technical, visual means to express researchers’ assumptions on the two relations to assess whether a finding on d is explainable by omitted confounders. The ViSe tool, available as an R package and Shiny application, allows users to choose between various effect sizes and apply it to their own data or published summary results.
Details
| Original language | English |
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| Pages (from-to) | 318-335 |
| Number of pages | 18 |
| Journal | Methodology |
| Volume | 20 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| Publication status | Published - 2024 |
| Peer-reviewed | Yes |
External IDs
| ORCID | /0000-0001-7646-8265/work/183164505 |
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Keywords
ASJC Scopus subject areas
Keywords
- causality, confirmation, effect size, observational studies, software, visualisation