Target audience

This course targets professionals and investigators from diverse areas ranging from researchers in the behavioral and social sciences to whoever deals with data with a hierarchical or multilevel structure.

Description

Social research often concerns relationships between individuals and the social contexts to which they belong. This can be conceptualized as a hierarchical structure, with individuals nested within groups.

Classical examples are educational research, with pupils nested within schools, and cross-national research, with individuals nested within their national units. They involve two level data: group level and individual level variables.

We need multilevel modeling to study the relationships between variables observed at different levels in the hierarchical structure.

This can also cover longitudinal research, by viewing measurement occasions as nested within respondents, and extends to situations where data have a more complex multilevel structure, such as cross-classified data or multiple-membership models.

This short course is intended as a basic and nontechnical introduction to multilevel analysis.

It starts with a description of some examples, and shows why multilevel models are necessary if the data have a hierarchical structure. It then covers the basic theory of two- and three-level models.

Next it explains how multilevel models can be applied to analyzing longitudinal data, and why and when this may be an attractive analysis approach, as compared to more classical analysis methods such as multivariate analysis of variance (Manova).

The cou​rse includes three computer labs, where multigroup and longitudinal data are analyzed. The computer labs in the course use the multilevel program HLM ​as a didactic analysis tool in combination with SPSS​, a free environment for statistical computing and graphics.

Course prerequisites

The course assumes reasonable familiarity with analysis of variance (as eg. taught in Module 5 of this year's program) and multiple regression analysis, but prior knowledge of multilevel modeling is not assumed.

Exam / Certificate

If you take part in all 6 sessions you will receive a certificate of attendance via e-mail after the course ends.

Additionally, you can take part in an exam. If you succeed in this test a certificate from Ghent University is issued.
The exam consists of a take home project assignment. You are required to write a report by a set deadline.

Type of course

This is an on campus course. 

Schedule

Three consecutive full days during the Easter Holiday: Wednesday April 12, Thursday April 13 and Friday April 14, 2023 from 9 am till 4 pm.

Venue

UGent, Faculty of Science, Campus Sterre, Krijgslaan 281, Ghent. Building S9, 3rd floor, pc room 3.1 (Konrad Zuse)

Teachers

Prof. dr. Leoniek Wijngaards-de Meij is Professor in Applied Statistics at the Department of Methodology and Statistics of the Faculty of Social Sciences at Utrecht University, the Netherlands. She received a Master in Clinical Psychology and a PhD in Dyadic processes of parents grieving their child in Clinical Psychology at Utrecht University.

She has worked as statistical consultant on multilevel analysis for numerous social science research projects.

She has been teaching courses on Multilevel Analysis on both Graduate and Undergraduate level. These courses include Multilevel for Research Masters, ML Minor courses and a Multilevel Summer School at Utrecht University, and PhD courses for several institutes including the KLI (Research Institute for Social Psychology), the EPP (Research Institute for PsychoPathology) and the Erasmus University.

Course material

Access to course notes and data files

Book recommendations

The course is based on: J.J. Hox and M. Moerbeek (2017), "Multilevel Analysis. Techniques and Applications", 3^rd edition, New York: Routledge, ISBN 978-1138121362. Those who wish to explore this topic further after the course can order it online or at their local book store. Please note that you do not need a copy of this book to follow the course.

Fees

A different price applies, depending on your main type of employment.

*If two or more employees from the same company enrol simultaneously for this course a reduction of 20% on the course fee is taken into account.

Register

Enrol for this course

UGent PhD students

As UGent PhD student you can incorporate this 'specialist course' in your Doctoral Training Program (DTP). To get a refund of the registration fee from your Doctoral School (DS) please follow these strict rules and take the necessary action in time. The deadline to open a dossier on the DS website (Application for Registration) for this course is March 14, 2023.

Opening a dossier with your DS does not mean that you are enrolled for the course with our academy. You still need to enrol via the registration form on this site.

It is you or your department that pays the fee first to our academy. The Doctoral School refunds that fee to you or your department once the course has ended.

It is not obligatory to participate or succeed in the exam.