Author Description

This book is meant as a basic and fairly nontechnical introduction to multilevel analysis for applied researchers in the social sciences. The term "multilevel" refers to a hierarchical or nested data structure, usually people within organizational groups, although the nesting may also consist of repeated measures with people or respondents within clusters as in cluster sampling. Multilevel model or multilevel analysis is used as a generic term for all models for nested data. The book presents two multilevel models: the multilevel regression model and a model for multilevel covariance structures. Multilevel regression models are essentially a multilevel version of the familiar multiple regression model. Multilevel covariance structure analysis would be a very powerful tool for the analysis of multilevel data. A general statistical model for multilevel covariance structure analysis is quite complicated, but chapter 5 presents a simplified model proposed by B. Muthen (1990, 1994) and explains how multilevel confirmatory factor and path models can be estimated with some conventional software. Six figures and 25 tables present study analyses. (Contains 110 references.) (SLD)