Confirmatory path analysis in a generalized multilevel context

Abstract

This paper describes how to test, and potentially falsify, a multivariate causal hypothesis involving only observed variables (i.e., a path analysis) when the data have a hierarchical or multilevel structure, when different variables are potentially defined at different levels of such a hierarchy, and when different variables have different sampling distributions. The test is a generalization of Shipley's d-sep test and can be conducted using standard statistical programs capable of fitting generalized mixed models.