| name | jde-data-analysis |
| description | Use when estimation, heterogeneity, attrition, measurement, or inference choices need to meet Journal of Development Economics (JDE) empirical norms — clustered field data, survey measurement error, and treatment-effect heterogeneity in low- and middle-income settings. Covers the analysis itself, not the identifying design. |
Data Analysis (jde-data-analysis)
When to trigger
- The identification is settled but the estimation, inference, or heterogeneity analysis is unconvincing
- A referee would question standard errors, attrition, measurement error, or sample construction
- You need to decide how to present treatment-effect heterogeneity across subgroups
- You are unsure the analysis would survive JDE's replication scrutiny
JDE empirical norms
JDE referees are experienced with the realities of field and survey data in developing countries — clustered sampling, panel attrition, noisy self-reports, seasonality, and small effective sample sizes. Analysis that ignores these reads as naive. Hold the work to these standards:
- Inference matched to the data structure. Cluster at the level of treatment assignment or sampling (village, school, market); with few clusters use wild-cluster bootstrap or randomization inference rather than naive cluster-robust t-stats.
- Attrition and missing data. Document panel attrition, test whether it is differential by treatment, and bound effects (Lee bounds) when it is. Survey non-response and refusal patterns belong in the appendix.
- Measurement. Be explicit about how key variables (consumption, income, yields, test scores, health) were measured and constructed; address recall error, social-desirability bias, and unit/seasonal issues. Pre-specify or transparently justify index construction.
- Heterogeneity, disciplined. Development audiences care about for whom effects bind, but data-mined subgroups are penalized. Pre-specify subgroups where possible; otherwise treat heterogeneity as exploratory and adjust for multiple comparisons.
- Magnitudes in welfare terms. Report effects in policy-comparable units (share of the poverty gap, cost-effectiveness per dollar, standard deviations) — see jde-contribution-framing.
Because JDE's replication policy lets editors or referees request data, programs, and computational details at the review stage, every number in a table must be reproducible from a script the day you submit. Build the analysis to be auditable, not just presentable.
Robustness expected
- Alternative specifications, samples, and functional forms in an extensive online appendix
- Sensitivity to outliers, winsorization, and index/aggregation choices
- Placebo / falsification outcomes that should not move
- Spillover/SUTVA checks where treatment may leak across units (common in village-level interventions)
Worked analysis (illustrative)
Hypothetical: a cluster-randomized health-extension experiment, 80 villages, ~30 households each, with 12 percent endline attrition.
- Inference: cluster at the village level; with 80 clusters report wild-cluster-bootstrap p-values too (illustrative ITT = +0.14 SD on a child-health index, p = 0.03).
- Attrition: 12 percent overall but 9 vs 15 percent across arms — differential, so add Lee bounds; the effect survives the lower bound (~+0.06 SD).
- Measurement: the health index mixes recall and anthropometric items; pre-specify weights and show robustness to inverse-covariance vs simple-average aggregation.
- Heterogeneity: only the baseline-poverty split was pre-registered; report it Romano–Wolf-adjusted, demote the rest.
Empirical-credibility pushback and the fix
| Referee objection | The JDE-norm response |
|---|
| "SEs ignore the clustered randomization" | Re-cluster at the randomization unit; wild-cluster boot / RI |
| "Differential attrition biases the effect" | Report attrition by arm; add Lee bounds; show the bound holds |
| "Spillovers violate SUTVA in your villages" | Distance-ring / treated-neighbor checks; bound the leakage |
Execution bridge (StatsPAI / Stata MCP)
Run the battery, don't just enumerate it. Full map:
execution-with-mcp. Development economics leans on RCTs and observational designs alike; field experiments demand the many-outcome family-wise correction (romano_wolf).
- Many outcomes / specifications:
romano_wolf (step-down FWER, accounts for
cross-test correlation) or benjamini_hochberg — report the adjusted threshold.
- OVB sensitivity:
oster_delta / sensemakr — the confounder strength that would
overturn the headline.
- Inference:
wild_cluster_bootstrap (few clusters), twoway_cluster / conley.
- Re-fit off one handle:
audit_result(result_id) lists the missing checks and the
exact suggest_function for each — no guessing the battery.
- Exhibits:
etable / did_summary_to_latex from the handle — no retyped numbers.
Keep the decisive checks in the body and the exhaustive (now actually-run) battery in
the appendix. See the executed chain in the JF execution walkthrough.
Anti-patterns
- Standard errors not clustered at the design level; ignoring few-cluster bias
- Silently dropping attritors or trimming the sample without reporting it
- A wall of unadjusted subgroup interactions presented as confirmatory
- Effects reported only in raw units, leaving importance unclear
- Tables that cannot be regenerated from the submitted code
Evidence pass for Journal of Development Economics
Treat this skill as an executable review pass, not a prose hint. First lock the development constraint, identification, welfare or distribution margin, and implementation context; then judge whether the current manuscript answers the venue's real reader: development economists who expect a development mechanism, credible design, and policy-relevant external validity.
- Do the pass: Audit the research design before polishing prose: unit of analysis, comparison set, uncertainty, sensitivity, missingness, and reproducibility must be visible.
- Return a ledger: give
claim / evidence / risk / manuscript location rows, so the next agent can edit rather than rediscover the issue.
- Sibling guard: compare against World Development for broader policy audience, JPubE for fiscal/public-finance mechanisms, AER/AEJ Applied for field-wide reach; if a sibling owns the contribution, recommend re-routing before polishing format.
- Stop condition: do not give submission-ready advice until the pack's
resources/official-source-map.md has been checked for volatile rules and the manuscript has one concrete fix for the largest venue-specific risk.
Output format
【Estimator】+ why it fits the design
【Inference】clustering level / few-cluster method / MHT
【Attrition】rate, differential? bounds?
【Measurement】key variable construction + error handling
【Heterogeneity】pre-specified vs exploratory
【Robustness done / missing】[...]
【Reproducible from code today?】[Y/N]
【Next step】jde-tables-figures
