This paper describes identification problems encountered in the regression discontinuity design pertaining to manipulation of the running variable and describes a simple test for manipulation. Optimal bandwidth choice for the regression discontinuity. If you were to go ahead and run the test anyways with discrete data, i am not sure what result you would get. Oct 21, 2019 we have revised a paper, joint with federico bugni, on the testing continuity of the density of the running variable in the rdd see paper here in the regression discontinuity design rdd, it is common practice to assess the credibility of the design by testing the continuity of the density of the running variable at the cutoff, e. One common use for this is to test for an overall effect ofa nominal variable represented by a series of dummy variables.
If there is a discontinuity in the density of the assignment variable at the threshold for treatment, then this may suggest that some agents were able to perfectly manipulate their treatment status. Statase and statamp can fit models with more independent variables than stataic up to 10,998. In addition, relative to the results in mccrary, 2008, otsu et al. A density test, nber technical working papers 0334, national bureau of economic research, inc. The proposed test is based on an estimator for the discontinuity at the cutoff in the density function of the running variable. To implement a manipulation test, the researcher needs to estimate the density of units near the cuto to conduct a hypothesis test about whether the density is discontinuous. Test for continuity in the density of the assignment variable at the cutoff.
How can i perform post estimation tests with multiply imputed. The mccrary density test mccrary,2008 identi es a discontinuity in the running variable at the cutpoint. Three distinct manipulation tests have been proposed in the literature. Graphical and statistical tests for robustness of sharp rd. This blog is a project of the esrc centre for microdata methods and practice cemmap at the institute for fiscal studies res589280001. Most of its users work in research, especially in the fields of economics, sociology, political science, biomedicine, and. Mccrary 2008 came up with a testing method for this purpose. We have revised a paper, joint with federico bugni, on the testing continuity of the density of the running variable in the rdd see paper here in the regression discontinuity design rdd, it is. Some sort of parametric functional form assumption is necessary. There are tons of free resources and video tutorials and you might get lostdistracted looking through them. Mar 19, 2018 new paper and stata package for continuity in rdd new working paper, stata packages in the regression discontinuity design rdd, it is common practice to assess the credibility of the design by testing the continuity of the density of the running variable at the cutoff, e.
Decio coviello justin mccrarys test for a discontinuity in the density of z at some point z0 where there is a known discontinuity in x, the. Visit the software page here for additional stata and r packages. I would like to graphically depict that there is no bunching around accounting related employee thresholds in my dataset. Testing continuity of a density via gorder statistics in. On april 23, 2014, statalist moved from an email list to a forum. So, i would suggest that at the beginning you start with one or two and then. Our antivirus check shows that this download is clean. Table 1 presents the results of a small simulation study on the performance of. A major issue with rd designs, in terms of internal validity, is whether units are able to manipulate their score on the assignment variable e. First, mccrary 2008 introduced a test based on the nonparametric local polynomial density. Mccrary suggests an empirical hypothesis test for this density discontinuity, making use of a density estimator originally proposed by. Manipulation of the running variable in the regression.
Rddtools is a new r package under development, designed to offer a set of tools to run all the steps required for a regression discontinuity design rdd analysis, from primary data visualisation to discontinuity estimation, sensitivity and placebo testing. In this article, we introduce two communitycontributed commands, rddensity and rdbwdensity, that implement automatic manipulation tests based on density discontinuity and are. Macro ugrad going nuts here, probably reading it wrong. Mccrary 2008 density test on data from lee, moretti, and butler 2004. Posts about stata written by cemmap software library. Mccrary 2008 provides a formal test for manipulation of the assignment variable in an. Manipulation of the running variable in the regression discontinuity design. We wish to warn you that since stata 11 files are downloaded from an external source, fdm lib bears no responsibility for the safety. In the table, design i corresponds to the data generating process. In rd settings analyses typically focus on the average e.
The latest version of this software, as well as other related software for rd designs. In the regression discontinuity design rdd, it is common practice to assess the credibility of the design by testing the continuity of the density of the running variable at the cutoff. Nov 22, 2019 there are tons of free resources and video tutorials and you might get lostdistracted looking through them. Stata data analysis, comprehensive statistical software. The new test is easy to implement, asymptotically valid under weaker. A pvalue below the significance threshhold indicates that the user can reject the null hypothesis of no sorting. Testing continuity of a density via gorder statistics in the. Newest densityestimation questions cross validated. And when you try, as you did, to restrict the the dcdensity command to data in the area of interest, the density it.
Thank you for providing an excellent statement of the problem that follows the guidelines in the faq you read. In a seminal paper, mccrary proposed the idea of manipulation testing via discontinuity in density testing for regression discontinuity rd designs, and developed an implementation thereof using the density estimator of cheng, fan, and marron, which. Mccrary density testing in stata twofold question, my understanding of the mccrary test is that if there is a discontinuity in densities between the cutoff point, then there is evidence of sorting, therefore bias. May, 2017 this paper proposes a test for manipulation of the running variable that is consistent when the running variable is discrete. Jul 14, 2019 the rddensity package provides stata and r implementations of manipulation tests employing local polynomial density estimation methods. Irrelevance of covariates to the treatmentoutcome relationship. For this reason, i dont think you can really use the mccrary 2008 density test code. Mccrary test of manipulation of the forcing variable. I am looking for something that would accomplish a test procedure proposed by justin mccrary 2008 manipulation of the running variable in.
See stata help file here code can be installed directly from stata. The test exploits the fact that if the discrete running variables probability mass function satisfies a certain smoothness condition, then the observed frequency at the threshold has a known. Inspection of the distribution of rreveals an unusual number of students. Questions tagged density estimation ask question estimation of probability density functions, whether by kernel density estimation, logspline estimation or other methods. Mccrary 2008 introduced the idea of manipulation testing in the context of. Ap is a dubious distinction, and savvy students may try to avoid it, perhaps by dropping a course. A major issue with rd designs, in terms of internal validity, is whether units. In the regression discontinuity design rdd, it is common practice to assess the credibility of the design by testing the continuity of the density of the running variable at the cuto, e. To download the product you want for free, you should use the link provided below and proceed to the developers website, as this is the only legal source to get stata 11. Mccrary 2008 introduced a test based on the nonparametric local polynomial density estimator of cheng, fan, and marron 1997, which requires prebinning. This method is useful for falsification of regression discontinuity designs, as well as for testing for selfselection or sorting in other contexts. Table 6 provides the discontinuity estimates of the mccrary test and figures 6 and 7 as well as figures d. Justin mccrary university of michigan december 2006 abstract standard su.
Welcome to the main library and scholarly commons library guide for stata data analysis and statistical software at the university of illinois urbanachampaign. The stata newsa periodic publication containing articles on using stata and tips on using the software, announcements of new releases and updates, feature highlights, and other announcements of interest. A preliminary version of this paper circulated under the title \simple local regression distribution estimators with an application to manipulation testing. Effects of participation in a postsecondary honors program with covariate. Mccrary 2008 density test on data from lee, moretti. And when you try, as you did, to restrict the the dcdensity. To download the product you want for free, you should use the link provided below and proceed to the developers website, as this is the only legal source to get stata. How can i perform post estimation tests with multiply. A difficulty is that balance only holds in the limit, and covariance balance may still be present in finite samples.
The test is implemented as a wald test of the null hypothesis that the discontinuity is zero. But the good news is that the two stata commands do it for you. Mccrarys dcdensity test in stata, graph 23 jun 2016, 08. This paper introduces an intuitive and easytoimplement nonparametric density estimator. The stata newsa periodic publication containing articles on using stata and tips on using the software, announcements of new releases and updates, feature highlights, and other announcements of interest to interest to stata usersis sent to all stata users and those who request information about stata from us. The actual developer of the program is statacorp lp. The stata journal university of california, berkeley.
Stata package is described in cattaneo, jansson and ma 2018. The problem, in a nutshell, is that it is not possible to instruct the dcdensity command to restrict the plot to a smaller region. Manipulation testing based on density discontinuity matias. Manipulation testing based on density discontinuity. The number of employees is my running variable and the accounting threshold lies at 50. Dear all, i am not very experienced with stata and this is my first post here. Mccrary 2008 manipulation of the running variable in the regression discontinuity design. Two companion stata and r software packages are provided. Stata is a generalpurpose statistical software package created in 1985 by statacorp. A difficulty is that balance only holds in the limit, and covariance. The test involves estimation of the discontinuity in the density function of the running variable at the cutoff. Related to the third point, you can also formally test for a jump in the density of the forcing variable around the cutoff.
Stata is a suite of applications used for data analysis, data management, and graphics. Whether the ratio of treated to control units departs from chance. I am looking for something that would accomplish a test procedure proposed by justin mccrary 2008 manipulation of the running variable in the regression discontinuity design. This will tell you again whether some manipulation is going on around the threshold. Mccrary 2008 suggested examining the density of observations of the assignment variable. Journal of econometrics, 1422, february 2008, pages. In this paper we propose a new test for continuity of a density at a point based. The estimator, which is a simple extension of the local linear density estimator cheng et al.
Estimation and inference of discontinuity in density. The test exploits the fact that if the discrete running variables probability mass function satisfies a certain smoothness condition, then the observed frequency at the threshold has a known conditional distribution. The mi test command can also be used to test nested models, where the null hypothesis is that the coefficients on two or more variables are simultaneously equal to zero. Mccrary 2008 density test on data from lee, moretti, and butler 2004, from button 2011. Standard sufficient conditions for identification in the regression discontinuity design are continuity of the conditional expectation of counterfactual outcomes in the running variable. Subjects or program administrators may invalidate the continuity assumption if they. A density test journal of econometrics test for breaks in the density of the forcing variable 1. Dcdensity mccrary sorting test description dcdensity implements the mccrary 2008 sorting test. To do this, i want to implement the mccrary test via the userwritten stata command dcdensity. Allows two choices of kernel testing endogenous sorting across treatment boundary. A density test journal of econometrics 142 2, 698714 best.