Social Science Statistics Blog

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5 February 2007

Applied Statistics - Jim Greiner

This week, the Applied Statistics Workshop will present a talk by Jim Greiner, a Ph.D. candidate in the Statistics Department. The talk is entitled "Potential Outcomes and Immutable Characteristics," and is based on joint work with Don Rubin from the Statistics Department. An abstract of the talk follows on the jump.

Jim graduated with a B.A. in Government from the University of Virginia in 1991 and then received a J.D. from the University of Michigan Law School in 1995. He clerked for Judge Patrick Higginbotham on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and was a practicing lawyer in the Justice Department and private practice before joining the Statistics Department here at Harvard. His research interests focus on causal inference and ecological inference, particularly as they relate to issues arising in the legal process. He is also the former chair of and a current contributor to this blog.

The Applied Statistics Workshop will meet in Room N354 in the CGIS Knafel Building (next to the Design School) at 12:00 on Wednesday, February 7th. Everyone is welcome, and lunch is provided. We hope to see you there!

Potential Outcomes And Immutable Characteristics

D. James Greiner & Donald B. Rubin

In the United States legal system, various directives attempt to reduce the relevance of "immutable characteristics" (e.g., race, sex) in specified societal settings (e.g., employment, voting, capital punishment). Typically, the directive is phrased in terms of a prohibition on action taken "because of" or "on account of" a prohibited trait, suggesting some kind of causal inquiry. Some researchers, however, have suggested that causal reasoning is inappropriate in such settings because immutable characteristics cannot be manipulated or randomized. We demonstrate that a shift in focus from "actual" characteristics to perceptions of traits allows application of the potential outcomes framework of causation to some (but not all) civil rights concerns. We articulate assumptions necessary for such an application to produce well-posed questions and believable answers. To demonstrate the principles we discuss, we reanalyze data from one of the most famous empirical studies in the law, the so-called "Baldus Study" of the role of race in the administration of capital punishment in Georgia.

Posted by Mike Kellermann at 7:09 AM