Counterfactual Reasoning in Observational Studies

Abstract

To identify the appropriate action to take, an intelligent agent must infer the causal effects of every possible action choices. A prominent example is precision medicine that attempts to identify which medical procedure will benefit each individual patient the most. This requires answering counterfactual questions such as: ""Would this patient have lived longer, had she received an alternative treatment?"". In my PhD, I attempt to explore ways to address the challenges associated with causal effect estimation; with a focus on devising methods that enhance performance according to the individual-based measures (as opposed to population-based measures).