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Schedule at a Glance
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Program: Scientific Session
General Topic: ARP

Stats Bootcamp 2: Methods for Analyzing Groupings that Cannot be Directly Observed and Measured: An Introduction to Latent Structures and Latent Variable Models

Monday, October 27, 2025
4:00 PM – 5:00 PM Central Time

    Moderator(s)

  • EL

    Elena Losina, PhD

    BWH
    Boston, Massachusetts, United States

    Disclosure(s): No financial relationships with ineligible companies to disclose

  • JC

    Jamie Collins, PhD

    Brigham and Women's Hospital
    Boston, Massachusetts, United States

    Disclosure information not submitted.

    • Session Coordinator(s)

  • Joshua Stefanik, PhD, PT

    Northeastern University
    Boston, Massachusetts, United States

    Disclosure information not submitted.

Important contributions to developing these approaches have emerged from the social and behavioral sciences. However, such techniques are applicable but remain underutilized in rheumatological research. We will discuss some uses of latent class analysis, latent transition analysis, and factor analysis specifically in rheumatology. We will use published manuscripts from related fields to explain how the results can be interpreted. This session should be helpful for researchers aiming to investigate the underlying unobserved factors influencing the occurrence or progression of disease/symptoms.

Learning Objectives:

  • Provide a non-technical overview of the methods contained under the latent structure analysis umbrella (e.g., factor analysis, latent class analysis, and latent transition analysis)
  • Differentiate between variable-centered and person-centered models
  • Demonstrate the similarity of these models with other dimension reduction methods (e.g., principal components analysis) and classification techniques (e.g., cluster analysis)
  • Explain how these methods can help address methodological challenges that arise in rheumatological research
  • Provide exemplar manuscripts from related fields to demonstrate interpretation of results from these methods

Presentations:

  • 4:00 PM – 4:30 PM Central Time
    Rationale and Research Questions for Latent Structures and Latent Variable Models

    Speaker: Todd Schwartz, DrPH – University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill

  • 4:30 PM – 5:00 PM Central Time
    Latent Variables Modeling Framework: Different Types of Latent Structures with Examples of Practical Applications from the Literature

    Speaker: Liubov Arbeeva, MSc – University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill