Exploratory mediation analysis refers to a class of methods used to identify a set of potential mediators of a process of interest. Despite its exploratory nature, conventional approaches are rooted in confirmatory traditions, and as such have limitations in exploratory contexts. We propose a two-stage approach called exploratory mediation analysis via regularization (XMed) to better address these concerns. We demonstrate that this approach is able to correctly identify mediators more often than conventional approaches and that its estimates are unbiased. Finally, this approach is illustrated through an empirical example examining the relationship between college acceptance and enrollment.

中文翻译：

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通过正则化的探索性调解分析

探索性中介分析是指一类用于识别感兴趣过程的潜在中介集的方法。尽管具有探索性，但传统方法植根于确认性传统，因此在探索性环境中存在局限性。我们提出了一种称为通过正则化的探索性中介分析 (XMed) 的两阶段方法，以更好地解决这些问题。我们证明这种方法能够比传统方法更频繁地正确识别中介，并且其估计是无偏的。最后，通过一个检验大学录取和入学之间关系的实证例子来说明这种方法。