Welcome! The Causal Reading Group is comprised of epidemiologists, biostatisticians, statisticians, econometricians, medical doctors, and social scientists who have an interest in causality. The reading group is open to anyone with an interest in causality, causal modelling, causal inference, or applications of the methods.
Meetings are held Mondays 2:30-3:45 at Purvis Hall, room 48 map and immediately precede an Epidemiology Seminar (4:00-5:00 PM) at Purvis Hall.
To be included to the mailing list, please email Laurence Brunet at laurence.brunet@mail.mcgill.ca
September 10: Corinne Riddell
Glymour MM, Tchetgen EJ, Robins JM. Credible Mendelian randomization studies: approaches for evaluating the instrumental variable assumptions. Am J Epidemiol 2012; 175(4): 332-9.pdf
Replies:
Re: “Credible Mendelian Randomization Studies: Approaches For Evaluating The Instrumental Variable Assumptions” Am J Epidemiol 2012; 176(5): 456-457. pdf
Re: “Credible Mendelian Randomization Studies: Approaches For Evaluating The Instrumental Variable Assumptions” Am J Epidemiol 2012; 176(5): 457-458. pdf
Authors Reply Am J Epidemiol 2012; 176(5): 458-459. pdf
September 17: Laurence Brunet
Howe CH, Cole SR, Mehta SH, Kirk GD. Estimating the Effects of Multiple Time-varying Exposures Using Joint Marginal Structural Models: Alcohol Consumption, Injection Drug Use, and HIV Acquisition. Epidemiology 2012; 23(4): 574-582. pdf
September 24: Ian Shrier
Greenland S, Pearl J. Adjustments and their Consequences—Collapsibility Analysis using Graphical Models. International Statistical Review 2011; 79: 401-426.pdf
October 1: Erin Strumpf
Earle CC, Tsai JS, Gelber RD, Weinstein MC, Neumann PJ, Weeks JC. Effectiveness of Chemotherapy for Advanced Lung Cancer in the Elderly: Instrumental Variable and Propensity Analysis. Journal of Clinical Oncology 2001:1064-1070. pdf
October 15: Menglan Pang
Norton EC. Log Odds and Ends. National Bureau of Economic Research 2012 Working Paper No. 18252. pdf
October 22: Olli Saarela
McCullagh P. Sampling bias and logistic models. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society: Series B 2008; 70(4): 643-677.pdf
October 29: Jeremy Labrecque
TBA
November 5: Robert Platt
TBA
November 12: Hailey Banack
TBA
November 19: Erica Moodie
TBA
November 26: Russell Steele
TBA
December 3: Ashley Naimi
Freedman DA, Berk RA. On weighting regressions by propensity scores. Evaluation Review 2008; 32: 392–409.pdf
January 10: Olli Saarela
Dawid AP, Didelez V. Identifying the consequences of dynamic treatment strategies: A decision-theoretic overview.
Statistics Surveys 2010; 4: 184-231. link
January 17: William Astle
McKeigue PM et al. Bayesian methods for instrumental variable analysis with genetic instruments ('Mendelian randomization'): example with urate transporter SLC2A9 as an instrumental variable for effect of urate levels on metabolic syndrome.
International Journal of Epidemiology 2010; 39: 907–918. pdf
January 24: Mireille Schnitzer
Gruber S, van der Laan M. Targeted Maximum Likelihood Estimation: A Gentle Introduction. Working paper link
January 31: Mireille Schnitzer
Munoz ID, van der Laan M. Population Intervention Causal Effects Based on Stochastic Interventions. Biometrics 2011. pdf
February 7: Robert Platt & Ian Shrier
Pearl J. On a Class of Bias-Amplifying Covariates that Endanger Effect Estimates. Technical report 2009.
pdf
Myers JA et al. Effects of Adjusting for Instrumental Variables on Bias and Precision of Effect Estimates.
American Journal of Epidemiology 2011. pdf
Pearl J. Invited Commentary: Understanding Bias Amplification.
American Journal of Epidemiology 2011. pdf
Myers JA et al. Myers et al. Respond to “Understanding Bias Amplification”.
American Journal of Epidemiology 2011. pdf
February 14: Erica Moodie
Bekaert M, Vansteelandt S, Mertens K. Adjusting for time-varying confounding in the subdistribution analysis of a competing risk.
Lifetime Data Analysis 2010; 16: 45-70. pdf
February 28: Ben Rich
Petersen ML et al. Diagnosing and responding to violations in the positivity assumption.
Statistical Methods in Medical Research 2012; 21: 31-54. pdf
March 6: David Stephens
Ertefaie A, Asgharian M, Stephens DA. Estimation of Average Treatment Effects using Penalization. Working paper 2012. pdf
March 13: Martine El Bejjani
Kramer MS et al. Breastfeeding and Infant Size: Evidence of Reverse Causality.
American Journal of Epidemiology 2011; 173: 978-983. pdf
March 20: Jay Kaufman & Robert Platt
Weuve J, Tchetgen Tchetgen EJ, Glymour MM, Beck TL, Aggarwal NT, Wilson RS, Evans DA, Mendes de Leon CF.
Accounting for bias due to selective attrition: the example of smoking and cognitive decline.
Epidemiology 2012; 23: 119-28. pdf
Chaix B, Evans D, Merlo J, Suzuki E. Commentary: Weighing up the dead and missing: reflections on inverse-probability
weighting and principal stratification to address truncation by death.
Epidemiology 2012; 23: 129-31.
Tchetgen Tchetgen EJ, Glymour MM, Shpitser I, Weuve J.
To Weight or Not to Weight? On the Relation Between Inverse-probability Weighting and Principal Stratification for Truncation by Death.
Epidemiology 2012; 23: 132-137.
March 27: Arijit Nandi
Abadie A, Diamond A, Hainmueller J. Synthetic Control Methods for Comparative Case Studies: Estimating the Effect of California's Tobacco Control Program. Journal of the American Statistical Association 2010; 105: 493-505. pdf
April 3: Raluca Ionescu-Ittu
September 6: Russell Steele
Taylor L, Zhou X-H. Methods for Clustered Encouragement Design Studies with Noncompliance and Missing Data.
Biostatistics 2011; 12: 313-326.pdf
September 13: no meeting
September 20: Raluca Ionescu-Ittu
Burgess S, Thompson SG. Avoiding Bias from Weak Instruments in Mendelian Randomization Studies.
International Journal of Epidemiology 2011.pdf
September 27: Olli Saarela
Chib S, Greenberg E. Bayesian Matching for Causal Inference. Unpublished Manuscript
pdf
October 4: Erin Strumpf
Basu A, Heckman JJ, Navarro-Lozano S, Urzua S. Use of Instrumental Variables in the Presence of Heterogeneity and Self-Selection:
an Application to Treatments of Breast Cancer Patients. Health Economics 2007; 16: 1133-1157.pdf
October 11: Ashley Naimi
Naimi A, Cole SR, Westreich DJ, Richardson DB. A Comparison of Methods to Estimate the Hazard Ratio Under Conditions of Time-varying Confounding and Nonpositivity. Epidemiology 2011; 22: 718-723.pdf
October 18: David Stephens
Vansteelandt S, Bekaert M, Claeskens G. On Model Selection and Model Misspecification in Causal Inference.
Statistical Methods in Medical Research 2010.pdf
October 25: Genevieve Lefebvre
Wang C, Parmigiani G, Dominici F. Bayesian Effect Estimation Accounting for Adjustment Uncertainty.
Biometrics 2011. pdf (supplementary materials)
November 1: Menglan Pang
Greenland S, Robins JM, Pearl J. Confounding and Collapsibility in Causal Inference. Statistical Science 1999; 14: 29-46.pdf
November 8: Jonathan Chevrier
Chevrier J, Picciotto S, Eisen EA. Comparison of standard methods with g-estimation of accelerated failure-time models to address the
healthy worker survivor effect in a cohort of autoworkers exposed to metalworking fluids. Unpublished Manuscript pdf
November 15: Robert Platt
Sjolander A, Nyren O, Bellocco R, Evans M. Comparing Different Strategies for Timing of Dialysis Initiation Through Inverse
Probability Weighting. American Journal of Epidemiology 2011; 174: 1204-1210. pdf
November 22: Nassim Mojaverian
November 29: Ian Shrier
Pearl J, Bareinboim E. Transportability Across Studies: A Formal Approach. Technical report 2011.
pdf (shorter version to appear in JSM 2011 proceedings)
January 18: Russell Steele
Greenland, S. Relaxation Penalties and Priors for Plausible Modeling of Nonidentified Bias Sources. Statistical Science 2009; 24(2): 195-210.
pdf
January 25: Robert Platt
Egleston BL, et al. A tutorial on principal stratification-based sensitivity analysis: application to smoking cessation studies. Clin Trials 2010;7(3): 286-98.pdf
February 1: Jay Kaufman
VanderWeele TJ. Interaction Tests Under Exposure Misclassification. Unpublished Manuscript (currently under review)
pdf
February 8: Sam Harper
Cole SR, Stuart EA. Generalizing evidence from randomized clinical trials to target populations: The ACTG 320 trial. Am J Epidemiol 2010;172(1): 107-15.
pdf
March 1: Ben Rich
Nedelman JR, Rubin DB, Sheiner LB. Diagnostics for confounding in PK/PD models for oxcarbazepine. Stats in Med 2007; 26(2): 920-308.
pdf
March 8: Genevieve Lefebvre
CRAINICEANU CM, DOMINICI F, PARMIGIANI G. Adjustment uncertainty in effect estimation. Biometrika 2008; 95(3): 635–651 doi: 10.1093/biomet/asn015
pdf
March 15: Carmen Messerlian
Mumford SL, Schisterman EF, Siega-Riz AM, Gaskins AJ, Wactawski-Wende J, VanderWeele TJ.
Effect of dietary fiber intake on lipoprotein cholesterol levels independent of estradiol in healthy premenopausal women
Am J Epidemiol. 2011 Jan 15;173(2):145-56.pdf
March 22: Michal Abrahamowicz
Flanders WD, Klein M. Properties of 2 counterfactual effect definitions of a point exposure. Epidemiology 2007 Jul;18(4):453-60. pdf
March 29: David Stephens
Hui J, Rubin DB. Principal Stratification for Causal Inference With Extended Partial Compliance. Journal of the American Statistical Association March 2008, Vol. 103, No. 481pdf
April 5: Raluca Inoescu-Ittu
Til Sturmer, Kenneth J. Rothman, Jerry Avorn and Robert J. Glynn. Treatment Effects in the Presence of Unmeasured Confounding:
Dealing With Observations in the Tails of the Propensity Score Distribution - A Simulation Study. Am. J. Epidemiol. (2010) 172 (7): 843-854. pdf
September 14: Jay Kaufman
VanderWeele TJ, Vansteelandt S. Conceptual issues concerning mediation, interventions and composition. Statistics and Its Interface 2009; 2: 457–468.
Link pdf
September 21: Igor Karp
Toh S, Hernández-Díaz S, Logan R, Robins JM, Hernán MA. Estimating absolute risks in the presence of nonadherence:
an application to a follow-up study with baseline randomization. Epidemiology 2010 Jul;21(4):528-39.
Link pdf
September 28: Russ Steele
Hoffmann K, Pischon T, Schulz M, Schulze MB, Ray J, Boeing H. A statistical test for the equality of differently adjusted incidence rate ratios.
Am J Epidemiol 2008 Mar 1;167(5):517-22.
Link pdf
Greenland S. Invited commentary: variable selection versus shrinkage in the control of multiple confounders. Am J Epidemiol 2008;167(5):523-9
Link pdf erratum
Pischon T, Schulze MB, Drogan D, Boeing H. The Authors Respond to “Variable Selection versus Shrinkage in Control of Confounders”
Am J Epidemiol 2008;167(5):530-1
Link pdf
October 5:
CANCELLED DUE TO SICKNESS (Re-scheduled October 26)
October 12: David Stephens
McCandless LC, Gustafson P, Austin PC. Bayesian propensity score analysis for observational data. Statistics in Medicine 2009; 28:94–112.
LinkpdfComments of DAS
October 19: Ben Rich
Arjas E, Saarela O. Optimal Dynamic Regimes: Presenting a Case for Predictive Inference The International Journal of Biostatistics 2010; 6(2): Article 10
Linkpdf
October 26: Mireille Schnitzer and Robert W Platt
Young JG, Hernán MA, Picciotto S, Robins JM. Relation between three classes of structural models for the effect of a time-varying exposure on survival.
Lifetime Data Anal 2010 16(1):71-84.
Linkpdf
Young JG, Hernán MA, Picciotto S, Robins JM. Simulation from Structural Survival Models under Complex Time-Varying Data Structures.
Proceedings of the Joint Statistical Meetings 2010.
pdf
November 2: Erica Moodie
Vansteelandt S. Estimation of controlled direct effects on a dichotomous outcome using logistic structural direct effect models. Biometrika 2010, xx, x, pp. 1–14
pdf
November 9: Michael Regier
Dawid AP. Beware the DAG. J. of Machine Learning Research: Workshop and Conference Proceedings 2008; 6:59–86
Link pdf
November 16: Michael Regier
VanderWeele TJ, Hernán MA, Robins JM. Causal Directed Acyclic Graphs and the Direction of Unmeasured Confounding Bias.
Epidemiology 2008; 19(5):720-728
Linkpdf
Additional paper if time permits:
Fleischer NL, Diez Roux AV. Using directed acyclic graphs to guide analyses of neighbourhood health effects: an introduction.
J Epidemiol Community Health 2008;62:842–846
Link pdf
November 23: Yongling Xiao
Hernan MA, Cole SR, Margolick J, Cohen M, Robins JM. Structural accelerated failure time models for survival analysis in studies with time-varying treatments.
Pharmacoepidemiology and Drug Safety 2005; 14(7): 477–491
Link pdf
November 30: Erin Strumpf
Carpenter C, Dobkin C. The Effect of Alcohol Consumption on Mortality: Regression Discontinuity Evidence from the Minimum Drinking Age.
American Economic Journal: Applied Economics 2009; 1(1): 164–182
pdf
December 7: Raluca Ionescu-Ittu
Hernán MA, Robins JM. Instruments for causal inference: an epidemiologist's dream?
Epidemiology 2006 Jul;17(4):360-72.
pdf
