does not align with the purpose and objectives of the research project or program. ToC for research evaluation Theory of Change serves as the main analytical framework in theory-based research evaluation. A Theory of Change also helps identify what data are necessary to test whether the change happened as hypothesized. As an ex post evaluation tool, evaluators can assess the actual achievements of research projects or programs against expected outcomes, increasing research transparency and accountability to results. Innovations New horizons of theory of change There are two areas of work that, although not coordinated with Theory of Change, offer much to think about in making Theory of Change more focused and effective: 1. The Annie E. Casey Foundation proposes mapping an organization's social change work along three criteria: Impact, Influence, Leverage. The impact of your work is its program outcomes Your influence is how much other actors change as a result of your work Your leverage is how much investment others put into your model. To date, Theory of Change has not distinguished impact, influence, and leverage as types of outcomes, but it may be useful to do so as a way of focusing the Theory of Change on measurable achievements. Particularly, when using Theory of Change to guide monitoring and evaluation, the Casey rubric helps focus the group's attention on outcomes, which could, if achieved, be convincingly attributed to the group's work. Other than direct program-related outcomes (impact), the Theory would anticipate outcomes in influence and outcomes in leverage. This approach could thereby help to avoid mapping outcomes involving broad shifts in behavior and values among whole populations, which are easy to think about, but are very difficult to monitor and to attribute to any one program. 2. Another refinement, which directly addresses this problem of attribution, comes from Outcome mapping. This process distinguishes changes in state from changes in behavior, changes in “state” being just those broad shifts in economic conditions, policy, politics, institutional behavior, and so on, among whole populations (e.g., cities, regions, countries, industries, economic sectors, etc.). Measuring changes in state can exceed the capacity of any one actor's monitoring capabilities. Governments collect data on changes in state but, of course, the data may not be calibrated to measure the kinds of change anticipated in any one Theory of Change. Changes in state are also, as stated above, difficult to attribute to any one source. In