HLMix™ Public Beta Available

Scientific Software International, Inc is pleased to announce the immediate availability of a public beta version of the brand new, entirely cloud-based software HLMix™ on SSI Live™.

HLMix™ is a cloud-based program for analyzing 2- or 3-level hierarchically structured data with a wide range of outcome variable distributions and link functions. The program features a point-and-click interface compatible with any common web browser. Output is provided in both HTML and text format. In addition to standard output expected from multilevel analysis software, HLMix™ produces simple slopes and confidence regions for three moderation model types. Statistical features not available in any of our other multilevel programs include odds ratios for the probit, complementary log-log and log-log link functions and intraclass correlations for models using the log link function.

A video demonstrating some of the functionalities of HLMix™ is available here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oExHQYLJAIY. Inquiries can be directed to sales@ssicentral.com.

New Features in LISREL 12

SSI is pleased to announce an additional feature now available in LISREL12. Users with active SSI Live™ LISREL subscription licenses can obtain this update free of charge by logging into My Account.

The Gauss-Newton iterative estimation algorithm is now available for single group LISREL models without and with intercepts (mean structures) and multiple group LISREL models without and with intercepts (mean structures).

New features available in LISREL12

SSI is pleased to announce additional features now available in LISREL12. Users with active SSI Live™ LISREL subscription licenses can obtain this update free of charge by logging into My Account.

The newly released version of LISREL 12 includes two new features:

  • HTML tables for selected LISREL results are generated for single group LISREL models to make inclusion of tabled results in publications easier.
  • For multiple group analyses, the CM option is now available. More specifically, the common metric completely standardized solutions for multiple group LISREL models with no equal parameters across groups can now be requested, and the computation of the standard error and confidence interval estimates for the within group completely standardized solutions for these models can be suppressed.

An example of the new output is given on the Examples page.

ANNOUNCING LISREL 12

SSI is pleased to announce the immediate availability of LISREL12. Users with active SSI Live™ LISREL subscription licenses can obtain this update free of charge by logging into My Account.

LISREL 12 introduces several new features that were not available in previous versions.

  • Two-stage multiple imputation Structural Equation Modeling for continuous, ordinal, and a mixture of continuous and ordinal variables are now available.
  • Confidence interval estimates for the parameters of LISREL models are now included.
  • Standard error estimates and confidence interval estimates for standardized and completely standardized solutions have been implemented.
  • An estimation algorithm for single group LISREL models with or without variance constraints for the endogenous latent variables has been added.
  • Path diagram files can be exported as enhanced metafiles which can be imported into other documents.
  • The multilevel generalized linear modeling application includes more link functions and computes estimates for the intra-class correlation coefficients.
  • The technical details of the new statistical methods as well as illustrative examples are available via the New Features option on the LISREL Help menu.

Fixed effects, random coefficients, centering

Steve Raudenbush, Lewis-Sebring Professor of Sociology, Chairman of the Committee on Education at the University of Chicago, and main author of the well-known HLM program, discusses the fixed effect random coefficient (FIRC) model and its implications for causal inference for multilevel data. A new feature in HLM, this feature is computationally convenient, with no dummy variables and no centering. The Tennessee STAR data is used as illustration in this 45 minute webinar.

This is the first in a series of webinars by Professor Raudenbush. A second webinar, discussing the use of the newly implemented profile likelihood plots feature in HLM in inference for variance components in hierarchical linear modeling, will be available soon. 

Updated version of HLM 8.2

SSI is pleased to announce an update to HLM 8.2. The update contains a new feature and a bug fix. Users with active SSI Live™ HLM subscription licenses can obtain this update free of charge by logging into My Account and downloading the updated version.

List of updates:

  • Previously, users could only import older Excel spreadsheets (*.xls extension). The option to import current Excel spreadsheets (*.xlsx) has been added to the program.
  • A bug with some spatial models running out of memory has been reported. This has been fixed.

Announcing the Release of HLM 8.2

SSI is pleased to announce the immediate availability of HLM 8.2. The update contains new features and bug fixes. Users with active SSI Live™ HLM subscription licenses can obtain this update free of charge by logging into My Account.

List of updates:

  • Profile likelihood plots for 2-level models with scalar tau has been added to the program. This new feature is available for all types of outcome variables.
  • A bug with adding interaction terms in crossed-and-nested models have been addressed.
  • A bug with weighting in very large data sets have been fixed.
  • The Fixed-Intercept-Random-Coefficient (FIRC) model implementation has been revised and improved.

UPDATED VERSION OF LISREL 11

The latest LISREL 11 version (11.0.3.2) includes the expansion of two-stage multiple imputation SEM for ordinal variables for single group LISREL models introduced in LISREL 11.0, released in June 2021. The expansion includes ordinal variables with different number of categories, continuous variables, and a mixture of continuous and ordinal variables for single and multiple group LISREL models. See the support page for technical details and the example page for worked examples.

In addition, the following updates were made:

1.  Corrections to the reading and writing of variable labels.

2.  Adjustments to the LISREL and SIMPLIS output formats.

Remembering Professor R. Darrell Bock

It is with great sadness that we acknowledge the passing of R. Darrell Bock. Among his many incredible contributions to science and psychometrics, Professor Bock was also co-founder and long-time President of SSI. The company would never have existed without Professor Bock and the history of scientific software would have been drastically different without his contributions. The staff at SSI express their heartfelt condolences to Professor Bock’s family and friends. For more information on his amazing life and contributions, you can find his obituary (penned by Robert Gibbons and Tania Bock) here, as well as an article remembering his life and contributions in UChicago News.