Structural Equations With Latent Variables !!HOT!!
Structural Equations with Latent Variables is a statistics textbook by Kenneth Bollen which describes the framework of structural equation modeling.[1] It is often used in graduate-level courses for structural equation modeling in the social sciences.
Structural Equations with Latent Variables
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Structural Equations with Latent Variables discusses LISREL/structural equation models and presents information on measurement validity and reliability, overall fit indices, model identification, causality, and other subjects.[2][3] The book features examples from sociology, economics, and psychology to illustrate the methods.
It is regarded that Bollen's book is the most extensive and attractive book on structural equations modeling currently available, going beyond a strict introductory purpose. The solidly written book contains a lot of information, and till 1989 say, a fairly complete state of the art of covariance structure analysis for continuous variables.One major, though hardly escapable, drawback of the book is that the field is still expanding so fast that some of the material was outdated as soon as the publisher ran to the publisher with the final manuscript.
An interdependent multivariate linear relations model based on manifest, measured variables as well as unmeasured and unmeasurable latent variables is developed. The latent variables include primary or residual common factors of any order as well as unique factors. The model has a simpler parametric structure than previous models, but it is designed to accommodate a wider range of applications via its structural equations, mean structure, covariance structure, and constraints on parameters. The parameters of the model may be estimated by gradient and quasi-Newton methods, or a Gauss-Newton algorithm that obtains least-squares, generalized least-squares, or maximum likelihood estimates. Large sample standard errors and goodness of fit tests are provided. The approach is illustrated by a test theory model and a longitudinal study of intelligence.
The use of structural equation modeling and latent variables remains uncommon in epidemiology despite its potential usefulness. The latter was illustrated by studying cross-sectional and longitudinal relationships between eating behavior and adiposity, using four different indicators of fat mass.
Using data from a longitudinal community-based study, we fitted structural equation models including two latent variables (respectively baseline adiposity and adiposity change after 2 years of follow-up), each being defined, by the four following anthropometric measurement (respectively by their changes): body mass index, waist circumference, skinfold thickness and percent body fat. Latent adiposity variables were hypothesized to depend on a cognitive restraint score, calculated from answers to an eating-behavior questionnaire (TFEQ-18), either cross-sectionally or longitudinally.
We briefly recall here the principle of this approach. Latent variables are used to translate the fact that several observed variables (also named manifest variables) are imperfect measurements of a single underlying concept. Each manifest variable is assumed to depend on the latent variable through a linear equation. The coefficients linking the latent and manifest variables are called loadings. A measurement scale has to be chosen for the latent variable. By convention, it is generally the scale of the first manifest variable, implying that the first loading is not estimated but fixed at 1. Because the indicators of the manifest variables are measured on various scales, it is useful to consider standardized estimates rather than raw loadings, using the observed standard deviations as measurement units for latent and manifest variables.
To validate the use of a latent variable approach, we fitted preliminary latent variable models to the four baseline anthropometric measurements (BMI, waist circumference, sum of skinfolds, percent body fat) to create a measurement model, as only one latent variable and its four manifest variables assessments are considered. We fitted such a model separately to measurements at baseline and two years later, first for the two sex groups, then for the entire sample. We also considered measurement models for the baseline measurements and their two-year changes explained by the baseline adiposity and its two-year change and we assumed the same relationships between latent adiposity and its four indicators at baseline and two years later; this model constrained the four loadings, i.e. the regression coefficients, to be identical for baseline adiposity, adiposity two years later and adiposity change (see appendix I). We considered variation rather than final values to avoid the problems of estimation and interpretation of coefficients issued from highly correlated variables [13].
All statistical analyses were performed on SAS9.1, using CALIS procedure. We log-transformed BMI, skinfold thickness and waist circumference to normalize their distributions and checked with Q-Q plots and Kolmogorov-Smirnov statistics that the transformed variables did not depart significantly from normal distributions. We chose to maximize the normal-theory maximum likelihood criteria. Among the various assessment of fit criteria, we focused on the root mean squared error of approximation (RMSEA) [14] and on the normed fit index (NFI) [15]. These criteria range from 0 to 1, with RMSEA close to 0 and NFI close to 1 for a correct fit. In order to build confidence intervals for indirect effects estimates or for the sum of direct and indirect effects, their variances were obtained by bootstrapping the sample subjects. A large number of bootstrap samples (1, 000) were used, to assess visually the assumed normal distribution of the estimators.
Results are given in Table 2. Analyses by sex showed that the covariations of the four baseline anthropometric measurements were correctly explained by latent adiposity with RMSEA between 0.00 and 0.16 and NFI between 0.97 and 0.99. The coefficients of determination R2, i.e., the squared standardized coefficients and the percentages of variance of each measurement explained by the latent variable were 0.65 for male skinfold thickness, both in 1999 and 2001. They were larger (between 0.83 and 0.96) in all other cases. The model did not fit as well the observations when all subjects were considered together, with RMSEA above 0.55 and NFI below 0.85, reflecting morphological differences between males and females, in addition to adiposity differences. Again this finding justifies the choice of running separate analyses for each sex. By contrast, the relationship between adiposity and anthropometric measurements can be expected to remain the same within each sex at baseline and 2 years later, and thus identical to the relationship between adiposity changes and measurement changes. Indeed, Table 2 shows that in each sex the loadings were similar in 1999 and 2001. This allowed us to impose equality constraints on these loadings and to consider models where the baseline measurements and their changes depended on the baseline adiposity. The model fits for the baseline measurements and their changes were only slightly modified when using constrained estimates in place of the specific ones: the largest decreases were found for the latent adiposity change, with NFI decreasing from 0.98 to 0.96 among males and from 0.99 to 0.96 among females. The loadings under equality constraints and the standardized coefficients are reported for each sex in Table 3.
Concerning the global fit of the model, RMSEA and its 95% confidence interval was 0.11 [0.093 ; 0.014] for females and 0.16 [0.14 ; 0.18] for males, while their respective NFI were 0.91 and 0.84. The regression coefficients for the four baseline anthropometric measurements on baseline adiposity and of the four measurement changes on adiposity change, i.e., the loadings, are given in Table 3. The standardized coefficients showed that BMI was the most highly correlated and skinfold thickness was the least correlated to the latent variables. The standardized coefficients of percent body fat, skinfold thickness and waist circumference were clearly lower for changes than for baseline measurements (around 0.6 or lower versus 0.9). On the other hand, the four BMI standardized coefficients were quite high (between 0.94 and 1.00).
Regression coefficient estimates of the structural model are summarized in Table 4. For males as for females, both baseline CRS and age were positively related to baseline adiposity. CRS changes depended significantly on the baseline adiposity: 95% confidence interval (CI95) = [0.18 - 0.70] for females and [0.22 - 0.94] for males; subjects of either sex with high baseline adiposity were more likely to increase their CRS over time. As expected, adiposity and CRS changes were negatively related to the corresponding baseline value, although the relationship was not significant for female adiposity.
If we had not used a latent variable approach, we would have fitted several regression models to study the longitudinal effect of eating restriction on adiposity. In particular the CRS change would have been separately regressed on each baseline anthropometric measurement, adjusting for the same explanatory variables as in the structural model. For instance, one can estimate the coefficients of a linear regression explaining how the percent body-fat change depends on its baseline value, age and change in CRS. Table 6 reports the estimates of the coefficients linking the four changes of adiposity indicators to their baseline values and their counterpart in the latent variable model. Results were consistent, with all coefficients significantly positive and Wald test values (coefficient/standard error) around 3. Similarly, it would be possible to regress any change of a given manifest variable on baseline CRS, adjusting for its baseline value, age and CRS change. The obtained coefficient would be directly comparable to the corresponding direct effect obtained in our analysis, but that simple regression approach would not provide any indirect effect. 041b061a72