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Title: Setting the Target: Precise Estimands and the Gap Between Theory and Empirics
Citation Type: Miscellaneous
Publication Year: 2020
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Abstract: The link between theory and quantitative empirical evidence is a longstanding hurdle in sociological research. Ambiguity about the role that statistical evidence plays in an argument may produce misleading conclusions and poor methodological practice. This ambiguity could be reduced if researchers would state the theoretical estimand— the central quantity at the core of a given paper—in precise language. Our approach envisions three choices in the research process: (1) choice of a theoretical estimand, which will be informative for theory, (2) choice of an empirical estimand, which is informative about the theoretical estimand under some identification assumptions, and (3) choice of an estimation strategy to learn the empirical estimand from data. Key advantages of this approach include improved clarity on the object of interest, transparency about how empirical evidence contributes to knowledge of that quantity, and the ability to easily plug in new statistical tools for estimation.
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Authors: Lundberg, Ian; Johnson, Rebecca; Stewart, Brandon, M
Publisher: Princeton University
Data Collections: IPUMS USA, IPUMS CPS
Topics: Methodology and Data Collection, Population Data Science
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