scriptBifac: A Function That Writes, Saves, and Exports Syntax for Fitting Bifactor Dyadic Models

Description

This function takes the outputted object from scrapeVarCross() and automatically writes, returns, and exports (.txt) lavaan syntax for specifying dyadic configural, loading, intercept, and residual invariant bifactor models.

Usage

scriptBifac(
  dvn,
  scaleset = "FF",
  lvname = "X",
  constr_dy_meas = c("loadings", "intercepts", "residuals"),
  constr_dy_struct = c("variances", "means"),
  writeTo = NULL,
  fileName = NULL
)

Value

Character object of lavaan script that can be passed immediately to lavaan functions.

Arguments

dvn: Input dvn list from scrapeVarCross()
scaleset: Input character to specify how to set the scale of the latent variable. Default is "FF" (fixed-factor; see Details for rationale), but user can specify "MV" (Marker Variable)
lvname: Input character to (arbitrarily) name the latent variable in lavaan syntax
constr_dy_meas: Input character vector detailing which measurement model parameters to constrain across dyad members.
constr_dy_struct: Input character vector detailing which structural model parameters to constrain across dyad members. Default is c("variances", "means")(in combination with defaults for constr_dy_meas, an indistinguishable correlated dyadic factors model), but user can specify any combination of "variances" and "means", or "none".
writeTo: A character string specifying a directory path to where a .txt file of the resulting lavaan script should be written. If set to “.”, the .txt file will be written to the current working directory. The default is NULL, and examples use a temporary directory created by tempdir().
fileName: A character string specifying a desired base name for the .txt output file. The default is NULL. The specified name will be automatically appended with the .txt file extension. If a file with the same name already exists in the user's chosen directory, it will be overwritten.

Details

By default, many dySEM:: functions (including scriptBifac()) default to a fixed-factor method of scale-setting, whereby the latent variance of a given factor is constrained to 1 for both partners in the configurally invariant model, and then one of these variances is freely estimated in subsequent models of the invariance testing sequence. We have selected this default for two reasons: (1) the selection of a marker-variable is usually arbitrary, yet can have a large influence on the estimation and testing of of structural parameters (see https://stats.stackexchange.com/questions/402133/in-cfa-does-it-matter-which-factor-loading-is-set-to-1/402732#402732); and (2) the selection of a non-invariant marker-variable can have disastrous down-stream consequences for the identification of non-invariant measurement parameters, following a the rejection of an omnibus invariance constraint set (see Lee, Preacher, & Little, 2011).

Examples

Run this code

dvn <- scrapeVarCross(
  dat = commitmentQ,
  x_order = "spi",
  x_stem = "sat.g",
  x_delim1 = ".",
  x_delim2 = "_",
  distinguish_1 = "1",
  distinguish_2 = "2"
)

sat.indist.script <- scriptBifac(
  dvn,
  scaleset = "FF",
  lvname = "Sat"
)

sat.lvars.script <- scriptBifac(
  dvn,
  scaleset = "FF",
  lvname = "Sat",
  constr_dy_meas = "loadings",
  constr_dy_struct = "variances"
)

sat.resids.script <- scriptBifac(
  dvn,
  scaleset = "FF",
  lvname = "Sat",
  constr_dy_meas = c("loadings", "intercepts", "residuals"),
  constr_dy_struct = "none",
  writeTo = tempdir(),
  fileName = "dBiFac_residual"
)

sat.ints.script <- scriptBifac(
  dvn,
  scaleset = "FF",
  lvname = "Sat",
  constr_dy_meas = c("loadings", "intercepts"),
  constr_dy_struct = "none",
  writeTo = tempdir(),
  fileName = "dBiFac_intercept"
)

sat.loads.script <- scriptBifac(
  dvn,
  scaleset = "FF",
  lvname = "Sat",
  constr_dy_meas = c("loadings"),
  constr_dy_struct = "none",
  writeTo = tempdir(),
  fileName = "dBiFac_loading"
)

sat.config.script <- scriptBifac(
  dvn,
  scaleset = "FF",
  lvname = "Sat",
  constr_dy_meas = "none",
  constr_dy_struct = "none",
  writeTo = tempdir(),
  fileName = "dBiFac_configural"
)

sat.source.script <- scriptBifac(
  dvn,
  scaleset = "FF",
  lvname = "Sat",
  constr_dy_meas = "loadings_source",
  constr_dy_struct = "none",
  writeTo = tempdir(),
  fileName = "dBiFac_source"
)