Society for Social Work and Research 17th Annual Conference: Social Work for a Just Society: Making Visible the Stakes and Stakeholders

January 16 - 20, 2013

RMW-1

Theory Construction and Causal Modeling

This workshop teaches participants strategies for constructing causal models on a conceptual level and provides participants with guidelines for how to statistically analyze data to gain perspectives on those theories. The first part of the workshop describes the building blocks of causal theories. These include direct effects, indirect effects(mediation), moderated causal relationships, spurious relationships,reciprocal causality, and feedback loops. Also considered are mediated moderation, moderated mediation, and moderated moderation. A range of thought experiments and thinking strategies for generating research ideas using these concepts will be described. The second part of the workshop focuses on issues to consider when statistically analyzing data to test a causal model. This includes how to translate a path diagram into a set of equations for analysis through different variants of structural equation modeling as well as key statistical and design factors to consider in the statistical modeling process.