What You Can and Can’t Properly Do with Regression

Regression analysis, broadly construed, has over the past 60 years becomethe dominant statistical paradigm within the social sciences and criminol-ogy. In its most canonical and popular form, a regression analysis becomesa \structural equation model" from which \causal e ects" can be estimated.Consider some examples from the two most recent issues of Criminology.Volume 47, Issue 4, has ten articles, seven of which employ some form ofcasual modeling. One exception (Mears and Bales, 2009) estimates causale ects using matching, another exception (Schultz and Tabanico, 2009) esti-mates causal e ects using randomized experiments, and the nal exception(Guerette and Bowers, 2009) estimates causal e ects using meta-analysis.

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