ISSN 1671-3710
CN 11-4766/R
主办:中国科学院心理研究所
出版:科学出版社

心理科学进展 ›› 2023, Vol. 31 ›› Issue (1): 145-158.doi: 10.3724/SP.J.1042.2023.00145

• 研究方法 • 上一篇    

变量相对重要性评估的方法选择及应用

朱训, 顾昕()   

  1. 华东师范大学教育心理学系, 上海 200062
  • 收稿日期:2022-04-06 出版日期:2023-01-15 发布日期:2022-10-13
  • 通讯作者: 顾昕 E-mail:guxin57@hotmail.com
  • 基金资助:
    国家自然科学基金青年项目(32100894);上海市浦江人才项目(2020PJC034)

Evaluation of predictors’ relative importance: Methods and applications

ZHU Xun, GU Xin()   

  1. Department of Educational Psychology, East China Normal University, Shanghai 200062, China
  • Received:2022-04-06 Online:2023-01-15 Published:2022-10-13
  • Contact: GU Xin E-mail:guxin57@hotmail.com

摘要:

高维数据爆发的背景下, 心理学研究目前急需变量相对重要性评估的有效方法。相对重要性评估的关键是选择合适的评估指标和统计推断方法。相对重要性的评估指标种类繁多, 优势分析和相对权重是重点推荐的相对重要性评估指标。相对重要性的统计推断方法适用情境不同, Bootstrap抽样是推断单变量重要性和两变量重要性差异的常用方法, 而贝叶斯检验是评估多变量重要性次序的新方法。线性回归模型之外, 相对重要性研究已拓展到Logistic回归模型、结构方程模型、多水平模型等, 但适用数据类型仍较为有限。相对重要性评估已广泛应用于心理学实证研究, 但存在不恰当的指标解释和方法选择问题。为此, 结合具体例子说明变量相对重要性的评估过程。

关键词: 相对重要性, 优势分析, 相对权重, Bootstrap, 贝叶斯因子

Abstract:

Psychological researches are more concerned with high-dimensional data than ever. The evaluation of predictors’ relative importance can explore or test the ordering of predictors’ importance, which promotes the effective use of variables with limited resources. This article reviews many aspects of relative importance, including its measures, inference, models, and empirical studies, in order to help researchers select appropriate measures and inference methods and provide directional suggestions for the relative importance studies.

Previous studies proposed various measures of relative importance with different interpretations and calculations. The traditional measure, standardized regression coefficient, considers only the unique effect of a predictor after controlling other predictors but ignores the independent effect of the predictor on the outcome variable. By contrast, the dominance analysis and relative weight measures take into account both the independent and unique contributions of a predictor on the outcome variable. These two measures are recommended because they decompose the R squared such that the contribution to the variation of the outcome variable is attributed to each predictor. Specifically, dominance analysis can be used when the research concerns different importance patterns, whereas relative weight is recommended when evaluating a large number of predictors. After estimating the importance measures, researchers can use the bootstrap sampling or Bayesian testing approach for the inference of the importance of predictors and their orderings. Bootstrap sampling is commonly used to infer the importance of a single predictor or the difference between the importance of two predictors. When comparing the importance of three or more predictors, the Bayesian approach can be used to test the importance orderings.

Besides linear regression models, relative importance analysis has been extended to logistic regression models, multivariate multiple regression models, and multilevel models but not to structural equation models and generalized linear mixed models. Furthermore, the robustness of relative importance has not been analyzed when categorical data is involved in these models. Relative importance analysis can be implemented in many statistical software, such as SPSS, R and Python. However, an integrated software incorporating different measures and inference methods is still absent. Although relative importance analysis has been widely used in psychological studies, researchers may select inappropriate measures and inference methods in different models. Therefore, a real data example is used to illustrate how the relative importance can be evaluated. Finally, we propose that further researches could focus on the applications of relative importance analysis in different models and various types of data together with the software development.

Key words: relative importance, dominance analysis, relative weight, Bootstrap, Bayes factor

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