Dawson Jeremy F, Richter Andreas W
Work and Organisational Psychology Group, Aston Business School, Aston University, Birmingham, United Kingdom.
J Appl Psychol. 2006 Jul;91(4):917-26. doi: 10.1037/0021-9010.91.4.917.
Researchers often use 3-way interactions in moderated multiple regression analysis to test the joint effect of 3 independent variables on a dependent variable. However, further probing of significant interaction terms varies considerably and is sometimes error prone. The authors developed a significance test for slope differences in 3-way interactions and illustrate its importance for testing psychological hypotheses. Monte Carlo simulations revealed that sample size, magnitude of the slope difference, and data reliability affected test power. Application of the test to published data yielded detection of some slope differences that were undetected by alternative probing techniques and led to changes of results and conclusions. The authors conclude by discussing the test's applicability for psychological research.
研究人员在调节多重回归分析中经常使用三向交互作用来检验三个自变量对一个因变量的联合效应。然而,对显著交互项的进一步探究差异很大,有时还容易出错。作者开发了一种用于三向交互作用中斜率差异的显著性检验,并说明了其在检验心理学假设中的重要性。蒙特卡洛模拟表明,样本量、斜率差异的大小和数据可靠性会影响检验功效。将该检验应用于已发表的数据,发现了一些替代探究技术未检测到的斜率差异,并导致了结果和结论的改变。作者通过讨论该检验在心理学研究中的适用性得出结论。