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We propose a method for inferring the existence of a latent common cause ('confounder') of two observed random variables. The method assumes that the two effects of the confounder are (possibly nonlinear) functions of the confounder plus…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2012-05-14 Dominik Janzing , Jonas Peters , Joris Mooij , Bernhard Schoelkopf

Discovering causal relationships from observational data is a challenging task that relies on assumptions connecting statistical quantities to graphical or algebraic causal models. In this work, we focus on widely employed assumptions for…

Methodology · Statistics 2024-03-20 Jonas Wahl , Urmi Ninad , Jakob Runge

Traditional recommender systems aim to estimate a user's rating to an item based on observed ratings from the population. As with all observational studies, hidden confounders, which are factors that affect both item exposures and user…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-11-22 Yaochen Zhu , Jing Yi , Jiayi Xie , Zhenzhong Chen

This study demonstrates the existence of a testable condition for the identification of the causal effect of a treatment on an outcome in observational data, which relies on two sets of variables: observed covariates to be controlled for…

Econometrics · Economics 2026-05-20 Martin Huber , Jannis Kueck

When domain knowledge is limited and experimentation is restricted by ethical, financial, or time constraints, practitioners turn to observational causal discovery methods to recover the causal structure, exploiting the statistical…

Confounding matters in almost all observational studies that focus on causality. In order to eliminate bias caused by connfounders, oftentimes a substantial number of features need to be collected in the analysis. In this case, large p…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2019-12-30 Shinyuu Lee , Yuru Zhu

The presence of latent variables can greatly complicate inferences about causal relations between measured variables from statistical data. In many cases, the presence of latent variables makes it impossible to determine for two measured…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2013-03-26 Peter L. Spirtes

We consider the problem of assessing whether, in an individual case, there is a causal relationship between an observed exposure and a response variable. When data are available on similar individuals we may be able to estimate prospective…

Statistics Theory · Mathematics 2023-11-15 Monica Musio , Philip Dawid

Recovering causal structure in the presence of latent variables is an important but challenging task. While many methods have been proposed to handle it, most of them require strict and/or untestable assumptions on the causal structure. In…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2025-10-28 Wei Chen , Linjun Peng , Zhiyi Huang , Haoyue Dai , Zhifeng Hao , Ruichu Cai , Kun Zhang

Causal disentanglement aims to learn about latent causal factors behind data, holding the promise to augment existing representation learning methods in terms of interpretability and extrapolation. Recent advances establish identifiability…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-12-25 Ryan Welch , Jiaqi Zhang , Caroline Uhler

"Monkey see monkey do" is an age-old adage, referring to na\"ive imitation without a deep understanding of a system's underlying mechanics. Indeed, if a demonstrator has access to information unavailable to the imitator (monkey), such as a…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2022-08-15 Daniel Kumor , Junzhe Zhang , Elias Bareinboim

The validity OF a causal model can be tested ONLY IF the model imposes constraints ON the probability distribution that governs the generated data. IN the presence OF unmeasured variables, causal models may impose two types OF constraints :…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2013-01-07 Jin Tian , Judea Pearl

We show that there is a general, informative and reliable procedure for discovering causal relations when, for all the investigator knows, both latent variables and selection bias may be at work. Given information about conditional…

Artificial Intelligence · Computer Science 2013-02-21 Peter L. Spirtes , Christopher Meek , Thomas S. Richardson

When data contains measurement errors, it is necessary to make assumptions relating the observed, erroneous data to the unobserved true phenomena of interest. These assumptions should be justifiable on substantive grounds, but are often…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2020-12-24 Noam Finkelstein , Roy Adams , Suchi Saria , Ilya Shpitser

Representation learning assumes that real-world data is generated by a few semantically meaningful generative factors (i.e., sources of variation) and aims to discover them in the latent space. These factors are expected to be causally…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2023-10-27 Xiaoyu Liu , Jiaxin Yuan , Bang An , Yuancheng Xu , Yifan Yang , Furong Huang

Unmeasured confounding presents a common challenge in observational studies, potentially making standard causal parameters unidentifiable without additional assumptions. Given the increasing availability of diverse data sources, exploiting…

Methodology · Statistics 2023-09-18 Shanshan Luo , Yechi Zhang , Wei Li

If $X,Y,Z$ denote sets of random variables, two different data sources may contain samples from $P_{X,Y}$ and $P_{Y,Z}$, respectively. We argue that causal discovery can help inferring properties of the `unobserved joint distributions'…

Machine Learning · Statistics 2023-05-12 Dominik Janzing , Philipp M. Faller , Leena Chennuru Vankadara

Time series forecasting is a critical task in various domains, where accurate predictions can drive informed decision-making. Traditional forecasting methods often rely on current observations of variables to predict future outcomes,…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2026-03-17 Wentao Gao , Xiaojing Du , Wenjun Yu , Xiongren Chen , Yifan Guo , Feiyu Yang

Models for analyzing multivariate data sets with missing values require strong, often unassessable, assumptions. The most common of these is that the mechanism that created the missing data is ignorable - a twofold assumption dependent on…

Applications · Statistics 2020-02-17 Iavor Bojinov , Natesh Pillai , Donald Rubin

We study identification and estimation of causal effects in settings with panel data. Traditionally researchers follow model-based identification strategies relying on assumptions governing the relation between the potential outcomes and…

Econometrics · Economics 2022-02-18 Dmitry Arkhangelsky , Guido W. Imbens