A Bayesian approach to misclassified binary response: female employment and intimate partner violence in urban India

ABSTRACT

We examine the effect of female employment on the odds of physical spousal violence using a Bayesian misclassification model combined with propensity score regression estimation. While a classical propensity score model finds a significant violence-provoking effect of female employment, our model finds no evidence of a significant effect. This suggests that misleading inferences are caused by falsely small standard errors in a model that does not account for uncertainties around propensity scores. Further, we confirm our misclassification model as a preferred specification using Deviance Information Criterion (DIC).

KEYWORDS:

• Bayesian misclassification model
• propensity score matching
• intimate partner violence
• female employment

JEL CLASSIFICATION:

• C11
• J12
• J21

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.