Causal Structure Learning

Abstract

Graphical models can represent a multivariate distribution in a convenient and accessible form as a graph. Causal models can be viewed as a special class of graphical models that not only represent the distribution of the observed system but also the distributions under external interventions. They hence enable predictions under hypothetical interventions, which is important for decision making. The challenging task of learning causal models from data always relies on some underlying assumptions. We discuss several recently proposed structure learning algorithms and their assumptions, and compare their empirical performance under various scenarios.