title: Mediation analysis in psychosomatic medicine research.
abstract: This article presents an overview of statistical mediation analysis and its application to psychosomatic medicine research. The article begins with a description of the major approaches to mediation analysis and an evaluation of the strengths and limits of each. Emphasis is placed on longitudinal mediation models, and an application using latent growth modeling is presented. The article concludes with a description of recent developments in mediation analysis and suggestions for the use of mediation for future work in psychosomatic medicine research.
authors.affiliation: Research in Prevention Laboratory, Department of Psychology, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85287-1104, USA. ginger.lockhart@asu.edu
authors.forename: Ginger
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Lockhart
authors.forename: David P
authors.initials: DP
authors.lastname: MacKinnon
authors.forename: Vanessa
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Ohlrich
mesh_terms: D015706:Bibliometrics; D003627:Data Interpretation, Statistical; D006801:Humans; D015233:Models, Statistical; D011110:Polymorphism, Genetic; D011611:Psychosomatic Medicine / Q000379:methods*; D012106:Research / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D012107:Research Design; D013223:Statistics as Topic / Q000379:methods*