“A Crash Course in Good and Bad Controls” (2022), by Carlos Cinelli et al. Mathematics research paper. Original abstract below, unchanged. No free PDF was found.

A Crash Course in Good and Bad Controls

Carlos Cinelli, Andrew Forney, Judea Pearl · May 20, 2022 · Mathematics

Abstract

Many students of statistics and econometrics express frustration with the way a problem known as “bad control” is treated in the traditional literature. The issue arises when the addition of a variable to a regression equation produces an unintended discrepancy between the regression coefficient and the effect that the coefficient is intended to represent. Avoiding such discrepancies presents a challenge to all analysts in the data intensive sciences. This note describes graphical tools for understanding, visualizing, and resolving the problem through a series of illustrative examples. By making this “crash course” accessible to instructors and practitioners, we hope to avail these tools to a broader community of scientists concerned with the causal interpretation of regression models.

Source page DOI: 10.1177/00491241221099552