Brief Introduction to Multilevel Analysis Claudia Flowers

Influence of Social Groups

Lots of Schools

Nesting of Our Data What would be the unit of analysis? Students? Spurious results Teacher? Fewer cases School? Much fewer cases

Conceptual Ecological Fallacy (Robinsons Effect) Analyze at higher levels are used to form conclusions at a lower level—assume all members of a group exhibit same characteristics (e.g., stereotypes) Atomistic Fallacy (Individualistic fallacy) Formulating inferences at a higher level based on analyses at a lower level Simpson’s Paradox Erroneous conclusions may be drawn if group data from heterogeneous populations are aggregated and treated as a single homogeneous population (illustration: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simpson's_paradox#Batting_averages)

Multilevel Analysis Multiple names: multilevel analysis, random coefficient model, variance component model, and hierarchical linear model.

Simple Conceptual Idea

Create Equations for Lots of Classrooms And More

Simple Conceptual Idea

Use the Betas in Our 2nd Level

Interested? Multivariate statistics Look at the last chapter in Steven’s textbook