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ERIC Number: EJ1189683
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2018-Sep
Pages: 12
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: EISSN-1931-7913
EISSN: N/A
Students Are Rarely Independent: When, Why, and How to Use Random Effects in Discipline-Based Education Research
Theobald, Elli
CBE - Life Sciences Education, v17 n3 Research Methods 2 Sep 2018
Discipline-based education researchers have a natural laboratory--classrooms, programs, colleges, and universities. Studies that administer treatments to multiple sections, in multiple years, or at multiple institutions are particularly compelling for two reasons: first, the sample sizes increase, and second, the implementation of the treatments can be intentionally designed and carefully monitored, potentially negating the need for additional control variables. However, when studies are implemented in this way, the observations on students are not completely independent; rather, students are clustered in sections, terms, years, or other factors. Here, I demonstrate why this clustering can be problematic in regression analysis. Fortunately, nonindependence of sampling can often be accounted for with random effects in multilevel regression models. Using several examples, including an extended example with R code, this paper illustrates why and how to implement random effects in multilevel modeling. It also provides resources to promote implementation of analyses that control for the nonindependence inherent in many quasi-random sampling designs.
American Society for Cell Biology. 8120 Woodmont Avenue Suite 750, Bethesda, MD 20814-2762. Tel: 301-347-9300; Fax: 301-347-9310; e-mail: ascbinfo@ascb.org; Website: http://www.ascb.org
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: Higher Education
Audience: Researchers
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Assessments and Surveys: SAT (College Admission Test)
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A