Unexpected Event During Surveys Design: Promise and Pitfalls for Causal Inference
Paper published at Political Analysis, 2019 DOI: 10.1017/pan.2019.27)
Posted: 26 Apr 2018 Last revised: 19 Jul 2019
Date Written: February 5, 2019
Abstract
An increasing number of studies exploit the occurrence of unexpected events during the fieldwork of public opinion surveys to estimate causal effects. In this paper we discuss the use of this identification strategy based on unforeseen and salient events that split the sample of respondents into treatment and control groups: the Unexpected Event during Surveys Design (UESD). In particular we focus on the assumptions under which unexpected events can be exploited to estimate causal effects and we discuss potential threats to identification, paying especial attention to the observable and testable implications of these assumptions. We propose a series of best practices in the form of various estimation strategies and robustness checks that can be used to lend credibility to the causal estimates. Drawing on data from the European Social Survey we illustrate the discussion of this method with an original study of the impact of the Charlie Hebdo terrorist attacks (Paris, 01/07/2015) on French citizens' satisfaction with their national government.
Paper published at Political Analysis, 2019 (https://doi.org/10.1017/pan.2019.27). PDF version available at authors' websites: www.jordimunoz.cat or http://www.falcogimeno.com/
Keywords: Methods, Causal Identification, Survey Research
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation