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Generalized multilevel structural equation modeling

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Abstract

A unifying framework for generalized multilevel structural equation modeling is introduced. The models in the framework, called generalized linear latent and mixed models (GLLAMM), combine features of generalized linear mixed models (GLMM) and structural equation models (SEM) and consist of a response model and a structural model for the latent variables. The response model generalizes GLMMs to incorporate factor structures in addition to random intercepts and coefficients. As in GLMMs, the data can have an arbitrary number of levels and can be highly unbalanced with different numbers of lower-level units in the higher-level units and missing data. A wide range of response processes can be modeled including ordered and unordered categorical responses, counts, and responses of mixed types. The structural model is similar to the structural part of a SEM except that it may include latent and observed variables varying at different levels. For example, unit-level latent variables (factors or random coefficients) can be regressed on cluster-level latent variables. Special cases of this framework are explored and data from the British Social Attitudes Survey are used for illustration. Maximum likelihood estimation and empirical Bayes latent score prediction within the GLLAMM framework can be performed using adaptive quadrature in gllamm, a freely available program running in Stata.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Graduate School of Education, University of California, 3659 Tolman Hall, 94720-1670, Berkeley, California, USA

    Sophia Rabe-Hesketh

  2. Norwegian Institute of Public Health, Oslo

    Anders Skrondal

  3. The University of Manchester, UK

    Andrew Pickles

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  1. Sophia Rabe-Hesketh
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  2. Anders Skrondal
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Correspondence to Sophia Rabe-Hesketh.

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gllamm can be downloaded from http://www.gllamm.org. The paper was written while Sophia Rabe-Hesketh was employed at and Anders Skrondal was visiting the Department of Biostatistics and Computing, Institute of Psychiatry, King's College London.

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Rabe-Hesketh, S., Skrondal, A. & Pickles, A. Generalized multilevel structural equation modeling. Psychometrika 69, 167–190 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02295939

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