I think the EA animal space is going beyond RCTs out of necessity, since RCTs have been hard to come by other than for diet change interventions (although their quality was previously quite poor, but better recently). Humane League Labs is researching the causal effects of corporate campaigns from observational data.
And you’ve already pointed out OPIS and the Happier Lives Institute, but HLI was incubated by Charity Entrepeneurship, which I think is generally looking beyond RCTs. They just put out their next round of recommended charities to incubate.
I think the EA animal space is going beyond RCTs out of necessity, since RCTs have been hard to come by other than for diet change interventions (although their quality was previously quite poor, but better recently). Humane League Labs is researching the causal effects of corporate campaigns from observational data.
And you’ve already pointed out OPIS and the Happier Lives Institute, but HLI was incubated by Charity Entrepeneurship, which I think is generally looking beyond RCTs. They just put out their next round of recommended charities to incubate.