17/08/2026
Congratulations to Prof. Devansh Pandey on the publication of the research article, “Targeted maximum likelihood estimation for psychological research: From causal identification to statistical inference,” in Acta Psychologica (ABDC A, Scopus, SSCI).
Causal questions have long been central to psychological research, particularly in randomized experiments. Formal causal-inference methods are now increasingly being applied to observational and quasi-experimental data, including consumer-psychology research on responses to advertising, platform design, pricing, and personalized recommendations.
The paper emphasizes that credible causal analysis begins with a clearly defined research question, target population, intervention or exposure, causal estimand, and identification argument before an estimator is selected.
The article offers an accessible and practice-oriented guide to Targeted Maximum Likelihood Estimation (TMLE), presenting it as the estimation stage of a broader causal-inference workflow rather than as a procedure that independently establishes causality. It also provides practical guidance on diagnostics, cross-fitting, and transparent reporting for applied researchers.
Article is available at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0001691826014113
