277,734 research outputs found
A Multilevel Meta‑Analysis
Insecure attachment to primary caregivers is associated with the development of depression symptoms in children and youth. This association has been shown by individual studies testing the relation between attachment and depression and by meta-analyses focusing on broad internalizing problems instead of depression or adult samples only. We therefore meta-analytically examined the associations between attachment security and depression in children and adolescents, using a multilevel approach. In total, 643 effect sizes were extracted from 123 independent samples. A significant moderate overall effect size was found (r = .31), indicating that insecure attachment to primary caregivers is associated with depression. Multivariate analysis of the significant moderators that impacted on the strength of the association between attachment security and depression showed that country of the study, study design, gender, the type of attachment, and the type of instrument to assess attachment uniquely contributed to the explanation of variance. This study suggests that insecure attachment may be a predictor of the development of depression in children and adolescents. When treating depression in children, attachment should therefore be addressed
Multilevel functional principal component analysis
The Sleep Heart Health Study (SHHS) is a comprehensive landmark study of
sleep and its impacts on health outcomes. A primary metric of the SHHS is the
in-home polysomnogram, which includes two electroencephalographic (EEG)
channels for each subject, at two visits. The volume and importance of this
data presents enormous challenges for analysis. To address these challenges, we
introduce multilevel functional principal component analysis (MFPCA), a novel
statistical methodology designed to extract core intra- and inter-subject
geometric components of multilevel functional data. Though motivated by the
SHHS, the proposed methodology is generally applicable, with potential
relevance to many modern scientific studies of hierarchical or longitudinal
functional outcomes. Notably, using MFPCA, we identify and quantify
associations between EEG activity during sleep and adverse cardiovascular
outcomes.Comment: Published in at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/08-AOAS206 the Annals of
Applied Statistics (http://www.imstat.org/aoas/) by the Institute of
Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org
Multilevel analysis in CSCL Research
Janssen, J., Erkens, G., Kirschner, P. A., & Kanselaar, G. (2011). Multilevel analysis in CSCL research. In S. Puntambekar, G. Erkens, & C. Hmelo-Silver (Eds.), Analyzing interactions in CSCL: Methods, approaches and issues (pp. 187-205). New York: Springer. doi:10.1007/978-1-4419-7710-6_9CSCL researchers are often interested in the processes that unfold between learners in online learning environments and the outcomes that stem from these interactions. However, studying collaborative learning processes is not an easy task. Researchers have to make quite a few methodological decisions such as how to study the collaborative process itself (e.g., develop a coding scheme or a questionnaire), on the appropriate unit of analysis (e.g., the individual or the group), and which statistical technique to use (e.g., descriptive statistics, analysis of variance, correlation analysis). Recently, several researchers have turned to multilevel analysis (MLA) to answer their research questions (e.g., Cress, 2008; De Wever, Van Keer, Schellens, & Valcke, 2007; Dewiyanti, Brand-Gruwel, Jochems, & Broers, 2007; Schellens, Van Keer, & Valcke, 2005; Strijbos, Martens, Jochems, & Broers, 2004; Stylianou-Georgiou, Papanastasiou, & Puntambekar, chapter #). However, CSCL studies that apply MLA analysis still remain relatively scarce. Instead, many CSCL researchers continue to use ‘traditional’ statistical techniques (e.g., analysis of variance, regression analysis), although these techniques may not be appropriate for what is being studied. An important aim of this chapter is therefore to explain why MLA is often necessary to correctly answer the questions CSCL researchers address. Furthermore, we wish to highlight the consequences of failing to use MLA when this is called for, using data from our own studies
Multilevel Quasi-Monte Carlo Methods for Lognormal Diffusion Problems
In this paper we present a rigorous cost and error analysis of a multilevel
estimator based on randomly shifted Quasi-Monte Carlo (QMC) lattice rules for
lognormal diffusion problems. These problems are motivated by uncertainty
quantification problems in subsurface flow. We extend the convergence analysis
in [Graham et al., Numer. Math. 2014] to multilevel Quasi-Monte Carlo finite
element discretizations and give a constructive proof of the
dimension-independent convergence of the QMC rules. More precisely, we provide
suitable parameters for the construction of such rules that yield the required
variance reduction for the multilevel scheme to achieve an -error
with a cost of with , and in
practice even , for sufficiently fast decaying covariance
kernels of the underlying Gaussian random field inputs. This confirms that the
computational gains due to the application of multilevel sampling methods and
the gains due to the application of QMC methods, both demonstrated in earlier
works for the same model problem, are complementary. A series of numerical
experiments confirms these gains. The results show that in practice the
multilevel QMC method consistently outperforms both the multilevel MC method
and the single-level variants even for non-smooth problems.Comment: 32 page
The Psychosocial Work Environment, Employee Mental Health and Organizational Interventions: Improving Research and Practice by Taking a Multilevel Approach
Although there have been several calls for incorporating multiple levels of analysis in employee health and wellbeing research, studies examining the interplay between individual, workgroup, organizational and broader societal factors in relation to employee mental health outcomes remain an exception rather than the norm. At the same time, organizational intervention research and practice also tends to be limited by a single-level focus, omitting potentially important influences at multiple levels of analysis. The aims of this conceptual paper are to help progress our understanding of work-related determinants of employee mental health by: (i) providing a rationale for routine multilevel assessment of the psychosocial work environment; (ii) discussing how a multilevel perspective can improve related organizational interventions and (iii) highlighting key theoretical and methodological considerations relevant to these aims. We present five recommendations for future research, relating to using appropriate multilevel research designs, justifying group level constructs, developing group-level measures, expanding investigations to the organizational level, and developing multilevel approaches to intervention design, implementation and evaluation
Multilevel IRT Modeling in Practice with the Package mlirt
Variance component models are generally accepted for the analysis of hierarchical structured data. A shortcoming is that outcome variables are still treated as measured without an error. Unreliable variables produce biases in the estimates of the other model parameters. The variability of the relationships across groups and the group-effects on individuals' outcomes differ substantially when taking the measurement error in the dependent variable of the model into account. The multilevel model can be extended to handle measurement error using an item response theory (IRT) model, leading to a multilevel IRT model. This extended multilevel model is in particular suitable for the analysis of educational response data where students are nested in schools and schools are nested within cities/countries.\u
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