Kosuke Imai's Homepage

Welcome

Kosuke Imai (pronounced K $\bar{\text{o}}^\prime\cdot$ sk $\bar{\text{a}}$ ) is Professor in the Department of Government and the Department of Statistics at Harvard University. He is also an affiliate of the Institute for Quantitative Social Science. Before moving to Harvard in 2018, Imai taught at Princeton University for 15 years where he was the founding director of the Program in Statistics and Machine Learning. Imai specializes in the development of statistical methods and machine learning algorithms and their applications to social science research. His areas of expertise include causal inference, computational social science, and survey methodology. Imai leads the Algorithm-Assisted Redistricting Methodology Project (ALARM) and served as an expert witness for several high-profile legislative redistricting cases. In addition, he is the author of Quantitative Social Science: An Introduction (Princeton University Press, 2017). Outside of Harvard, Imai served as the President of the Society for Political Methodology from 2017 to 2019.

His current research interests include: data-driven policy learning and evaluation, causal inference with high-dimensional and unstructured treatments (e.g., texts, images, videos, and maps), fairness and racial disparity analysis, algorithmic redistricting analysis, data fusion and record linkage, census and privacy.

During the academic year 2024-2025, I am spending my sabbatical at Nuffield College, University of Oxford.

Contact Information

1737 Cambridge Street
Institute for Quantitative Social Science
Harvard University
Cambridge, MA 02138

Phone: 617-384-6778
Email: Imai at Harvard dot Edu
URL: https://imai.fas.harvard.edu

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Selected Recent Presentations

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Lecture Videos

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News

07.24.25. Methods Lecture: NBER Summer Institute

07.17.25. Talk: Society for Political Methodology Summer Meeting

07.08.25. Paper: ``GenAI Powered Inference.'' is now available

07.08.25. Article: ``Bayesian Safe Policy Learning with Chance Constrained Optimization: Application to Military Security Assessment during the Vietnam War.'' has been accepted for publication in Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, Series A (Statistics in Society)

07.07.25. Article: ``Using AI to Summarize US Presidential Campaign TV Advertisement Videos, 1952-2012.'' has been accepted for publication in Scientific Data.

07.06.25. Talk: Japanese Society for Quantitative Political Science, Summer Meeting

07.04.25. Talk: University of Tokyo

06.25.25. Keynote Talk: Simon Fraser University

06.20.25. Article: ``Estimating Racial Disparities When Race is Not Observed.'' has been accepted for publication in Journal of the American Statistical Association

06.16.25. Talk: University of Vienna

06.10.25. Discussant: Online Causal Inference Seminar

06.04.25. Distinguished Lecture: University of Konstanz

05.29.25. Article: ``Estimating Heterogeneous Causal Effects of High-Dimensional Treatments: Application to Conjoint Analysis.'' has been published in Annals of Applied Statistics

05.20.25. Talk: Oxford Computational Political Science Group

05.16.25. Talk: University of Cambridge

05.15.25. Paper: ``Statistical Decision Theory with Counterfactual Loss.'' is now available

04.30.25. Talk: Copenhagen Business School

04.25.25. Talk: Operations Research Center, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

04.09.25. Article: ``A Comment on: Fisher-Schultz Lecture: Generic Machine Learning Inference on Heterogenous Treatment Effects in Randomized Experiments, with an Application to Immunization in India.'' has been accepted for publication in Econometrica

04.07.25. Keynote Talk: Political Methodology Europe Conference, London School of Economics and Political Science

04.07.25. Paper: ``Spatiotemporal causal inference with arbitrary spillover and carryover effects.'' is now available

04.03.25. Talk: Guest Speaker, Oxford Spring School in Advanced Research Methods, University of Oxford

04.01.25. Article: ``Safe Policy Learning through Extrapolation: Application to Pre-trial Risk Assessment.'' has been accepted for publication in Journal of the American Statistical Association

04.01.25. Talk: Connected Politics Seminar, University College of Dublin

03.31.25. Talk: Political Science Seminar, Trinity College of Dublin

03.19.25. Talk: CIS Seminar, ETH and University of Zurich

03.14.25. Talk: Statistics Seminar, Imperial College of London

03.13.25. Talk: Distinguished Seminar, Department of Statistics, University of Oxford

03.07.25. Talk: WBZ Berlin Social Science Center

03.06.25. Talk: Hertie School

03.04.25. Talk: Distinguished Lecture, University of Mannheim

02.26.25. Talk: Statistics Seminar, Lancaster University

02.11.25. Talk: Political Science Seminar, University of Oxford

02.07.25. Talk: Econometrics Seminar, University of Oxford

02.06.25. Article: ``Estimating Average Treatment Effects with Support Vector Machines.'' has been published in Statistics in Medicine

02.06.25. Talk: Nuffield College, University of Oxford

02.04.25. Talk: University of Essex

01.24.25. Talk: London School of Economics and Political Science

01.21.25. Talk: Google DeepMind

01.09.25. Talk: Victoria University of Wellington

01.05.25. Talk: Japanese Society for Quantitative Political Science Conference

12.19.24. Paper: ``Estimating Heterogeneous Treatment Effects for Spatio-Temporal Causal Inference: How Economic Assistance Moderates the Effects of Airstrikes on Insurgent Violence'' is now available

12.18.24. Paper: ``Minimax Regret Estimation for Generalizing Heterogeneous Treatment Effects with Multisite Data '' is now available

12.18.24. Article: ``Statistical Inference for Heterogeneous Treatment Effects Discovered by Generic Machine Learning in Randomized Experiments.'' has been published in Journal of Business & Economic Statistics

12.17.24. Talk: Royal Statistical Society, UK

12.13.24. Article: ``Priming bias versus post-treatment bias in experimental designs..'' has been accepted for publication in Political Analysis

12.11.24. Talk: University of College London, UK

12.06.24. Talk: University of Oxford, UK

12.03.24. Article: ``A Summer Bridge Program for First-Generation Low-Income Students Stretches Academic Ambitions with No Adverse Impacts on GPA.'' has been published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

12.03.23. Article: ``Policy Learning with Asymmetric Counterfactual Utilities.'' has been published in Journal of the American Statistical Association

11.20.24. Award: Highly Cited Researcher by Clarivate

11.18.24. Article: ``Measuring and Modeling Neighborhoods.'' has been published in American Political Science Review

11.11.24. Talk: University of Tokyo, Japan

11.08.24. Talk: Waseda University, Japan

11.05.24. Talk: University College Dublin, Ireland

10.31.24. Talk: University of Louvain, Belgium

10.27.24. Paper: ``Longitudinal Causal Inference with Selective Eligibility'' is now available

10.24.24. Talk: University of Manchester, UK

10.20.24. Paper: ``Estimating the Partisan Bias of Japanese Legislative Redistricting Plans Using a Simulation Algorithm'' is now available

10.13.24. Talk: University of Aix-Marseille, France

10.08.24. Talk: University of Fribourg, Switzerland

10.05.24. Article: ``Using Machine Learning to Test Causal Hypotheses in Conjoint Analysis.'' has been published in Political Analysis

10.02.24. Paper: ``Causal Representation Learning with Generative Artificial Intelligence: Application to Texts as Treatments'' is now available

10.02.24. Talk: European Federation of Statisticians in the Pharmaceutical Industry

09.27.24. Talk: Florence, Italy

09.23.24. Talk: Institute for Quantitative Social Science, Harvard University

09.16.24. Talk: University of Pennsylvania

08.06.24. ``Neyman Meets Causal Machine Learning: Experimental Evaluation of Individualized Treatment Rules.'' is now published in Journal of Causal Inference.

08.05.24. Talk: Joint Statistical Meetings