Quantitative Economics
Journal Of The Econometric Society
Edited by: Stéphane Bonhomme • Print ISSN: 1759-7323 • Online ISSN: 1759-7331
Edited by: Stéphane Bonhomme • Print ISSN: 1759-7323 • Online ISSN: 1759-7331
Quantitative Economics: Jul, 2018, Volume 9, Issue 2
Charles F. Manski
This paper studies an identification problem that arises when clinicians seek to personalize patient care by predicting health outcomes conditional on observed patient covariates. Let y be an outcome of interest and let (x=k, w=j) be observed patient covariates. Suppose a clinician wants to choose a care option that maximizes a patient's expected utility conditional on the observed covariates. To accomplish this, the clinician needs to know the conditional probability distribution P(y|x=k, w=j). It is common to have a trustworthy evidence‐based risk assessment that predicts y conditional on a subset of the observed covariates, say x, but not conditional on (x, w). Then the clinician knows P(y|x=k) but not P(y|x=k, w=j). Research on the ecological inference problem studies partial identification of P(y|x, w) given knowledge of P(y|x) and P(w|x). Combining this knowledge with structural assumptions yields tighter conclusions. A psychological literature comparing actuarial predictions and clinical judgments has concluded that clinicians should not attempt to subjectively predict patient outcomes conditional on covariates that are not utilized in evidence‐based risk assessments. I argue that formalizing clinical judgment through analysis of the identification problem can improve risk assessments and care decisions.
Ambiguity clinical judgment partial identification patient care C14 I19
March 5, 2024
The terms of the Editors of the Econometric Society's three journals end June 30, 2025. We are pleased to announce the incoming Editors and to thank the outgoing Editors for their excellent and continuing service.
Econometrica: Since 2019, Guido Imbens has served as the 14th Editor of Econometrica. On July 1, 2025, Marina Halac will become the Editor.
Quantitative Economics: Stéphane Bonhomme has been the Editor of Quantitative Economics since 2021. His successor will be Bernard Salanié.
Theoretical Economics: The Editor of Theoretical Economics since 2021 has been Simon Board. Taking over for him in July 2025 will be Federico Echenique.
Guido, Stéphane, and Simon have been outstanding Editors. We are grateful to them for the work they have done and will continue to do, and we look forward to further congratulating them next year. We believe Marina, Bernard, and Federico will be outstanding successors and we thank them in advance for their service.
Finally, we are grateful to Larry Samuelson for chairing all three search committees, and we thank the search committee members for their hard and fruitful work:
Econometrica: Christian Dustmann, Lars Hansen, Alessandro Lizzeri, George Mailath, Ariel Pakes, Helene Rey, and Elie Tamer.
QE: Kate Ho, Michael Keane, Felix Kubler, Whitney Newey, and Frank Schorfheide.
TE: Jeff Ely, Johannes Horner, Gilat Levy, Meg Meyer, and Ran Spiegler.