Evidence map›Paper›PMID 29755141›Full record

ArticleThe quarterly journal of economics2018

HUMAN DECISIONS AND MACHINE PREDICTIONS.

Jon Kleinberg, Himabindu Lakkaraju, Jure Leskovec, Jens Ludwig, Sendhil Mullainathan

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in The quarterly journal of economics, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 72 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
72citing papers in PubMed, 2 pooled it
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

72 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.

  1. Language-based game theory in the age of artificial intelligence.Journal of the Royal Society, Interface · 2024
    Pooled it
  2. Pooled it
  3. Measuring disparate impact in human and machine decisions.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026
    Article
  4. Article
  5. Article
  6. Article
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  8. How public involvement can improve the science of AI.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Review
  9. Article
  10. Does AI help humans make better decisions? A statistical evaluation framework for experimental and observational studies.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
  11. Article
  12. Article
  13. Article
  14. Building Nondiscriminatory Algorithms in Selected Data.American economic review. Insights · 2025
    Article
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  16. Article
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  18. Article
  19. Social Preferences Toward Humans and Machines: A Systematic Experiment on the Role of Machine Payoffs.Perspectives on psychological science : a journal of the Association for Psychological Science · 2025
    Article
  20. Article

12 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Jon KleinbergCornell University.
Himabindu LakkarajuStanford University.
Jure LeskovecStanford University.
Jens LudwigUniversity of Chicago and NBER.
Sendhil MullainathanHarvard University, CEPR, NBER and BREAD.

Funding

Training CoreU54EB020405 · NIBIB · STANFORD UNIVERSITY · PI DELP, SCOTT L · 2014 to 2018
$11.6M
NIBIB NIH HHS U54 EB020405
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Can machine learning improve human decision making? Bail decisions provide a good test case. Millions of times each year, judges make jail-or-release decisions that hinge on a prediction of what a defendant would do if released. The concreteness of the prediction task combined with the volume of data available makes this a promising machine-learning application. Yet comparing the algorithm to judges proves complicated. First, the available data are generated by prior judge decisions. We only observe crime outcomes for released defendants, not for those judges detained. This makes it hard to evaluate counterfactual decision rules based on algorithmic predictions. Second, judges may have a broader set of preferences than the variable the algorithm predicts; for instance, judges may care specifically about violent crimes or about racial inequities. We deal with these problems using different econometric strategies, such as quasi-random assignment of cases to judges. Even accounting for these concerns, our results suggest potentially large welfare gains: one policy simulation shows crime reductions up to 24.7% with no change in jailing rates, or jailing rate reductions up to 41.9% with no increase in crime rates. Moreover, all categories of crime, including violent crimes, show reductions; and these gains can be achieved while simultaneously reducing racial disparities. These results suggest that while machine learning can be valuable, realizing this value requires integrating these tools into an economic framework: being clear about the link between predictions and decisions; specifying the scope of payoff functions; and constructing unbiased decision counterfactuals.

Identifiers

PMID29755141
PMCPMC5947971

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.