Applied Longitudinal Data Analysis

The investigation of change has fascinated empirical researchers for generations, and to do it well, they must have longitudinal data. This much-needed professional book will instruct readers in the many new methodologies now at their disposal to make the best use of longitudinal data, including both individual growth modeling and survival analysis, making it a unique contribution to the literature on research methods. The authors employ many cases and examples froma variety of disciplines, covering multilevel models, curvilinear and discontinuous change, in addition to discrete-time hazard models, continuous-time event occurrence, and Cox regression models.

Change is constant in everyday life. Infants crawl and then walk, children learn to read and write, teenagers mature in myriad ways, the elderly become frail and forgetful. Beyond these natural processes and events, external forces and interventions instigate and disrupt change: test scores
may rise after a coaching course, drug abusers may remain abstinent after residential treatment. By charting changes over time and investigating whether and when events occur, researchers reveal the temporal rhythms of our lives. Applied Longitudinal Data Analysis is a much-needed professional book
for empirical researchers and graduate students in the behavioral, social, and biomedical sciences. It offers the first accessible in-depth presentation of two of today's most popular statistical methods: multilevel models for individual change and hazard/survival models for event occurrence (in
both discrete- and continuous-time). Using clear, concise prose and real data sets from published studies, the authors take you step by step through complete analyses, from simple exploratory displays that reveal underlying patterns through sophisticated specifications of complex statistical models.
Applied Longitudinal Data Analysis offers readers a private consultation session with internationally recognized experts and represents a unique contribution to the literature on quantitative empirical methods.
Visit http: //www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/examples/alda.htm for:
BL Downloadable data sets
BL Library of computer programs in SAS, SPSS, Stata, HLM, MLwiN, and more
BL Additional material for data analysis