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  "path": "/t/thinking-clearly-about-association-studies-risk-factors-and-causal-salad-included/28679#post_13",
  "publishedAt": "2026-03-31T08:49:24.000Z",
  "site": "https://discourse.datamethods.org",
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  "textContent": "f2harrell:\n\n> Showing the relative explained variation of a set of potential confounders in predicting treatment choice. It’s amazing how many papers using propensity scores fail to decode the scores.\n\nI think some of the causal people take issue with this being called _descriptive_ research, because confounders are a causal concept. For example here. Your emphasis on explained variation vs presenting a table with conditional coefficients and (implicitly) interpreting them as causal is important, but maybe it’s also a bit of slippery slope?",
  "title": "Thinking Clearly about Association Studies (Risk Factors and Causal Salad included)"
}