Caregiver cognitive status and potentially harmful caregiver behavior.

The association between caregiver cognitive status and potentially harmful caregiver behavior was assessed in a sample of 180 caregiver-care recipient dyads. Compromised cognitive status was identified in 39% of these informal caregivers. Beyond variance explained by demographic factors, amount of care provided, care recipient cognitive status, and caregiver depressed affect, care recipients reported more frequently being subjected to potentially harmful caregiver behavior when their caregivers evidenced compromised cognitive status. While preliminary, critical areas of caregiver cognition appeared to be deficits in language comprehension and memory. Results indicate that compromised cognitive status is common among informal caregivers of impaired elders and that this may adversely influence the quality of care they provide.

Evaluation of a Structural Model Relating Job Satisfaction, Organizational Commitment, and Precursors to Voluntary Turnover.

An integrative model of the determinants of overall job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and precursors to voluntary turnover was proposed. Job satisfaction and organizational commitment were proposed to arise from overlapping sets of work environment perceptions. A nonrecursive relationship was hypothesized between commitment and satisfaction. Affect (satisfaction and commitment) was proposed to mediate the effects of work environment perceptions on precursors to voluntary turnover. The model was evaluated using data obtained from 1,870 employees of a U.S. telecommunications firm. Hypotheses relating to determinants of commitment and turnover cognitions were largely supported. An asymmetric reciprocal relation was supported between overall job satisfaction and organizational commitment. Future research needs discussed include specification of different causal models for different forms of employee turnover.

Disturbance Term Regression Tests: A Note on the Computation of Standard Errors.

I (Lance, 1986) described disturbance term regression tests of zero-effect hypotheses in path models and showed that these tests can be effected from variables' correlations or covariances. In this article, standard errors for unstandardized disturbance term regression coefficients are derived from variables' covariances.

Limited Information Parameter Estimates for Latent or Mixed Manifest and Latent Variable Models.

We argue for separate analyses of the measurement and structural portions of latent or mixed manifest and latent variable models. We present limited information (single equation) procedures for estimating parameters in the structural portion of these models. These include parameter estimation procedures for recursive or nonrecursive relations, and procedures for testing zero-effect hypotheses. We then compare full and limited information estimates in a Monte Carlo analysis of sample correlation matrices that contained structural model misspecifications. Both full and limited information estimates identified misspecified nonzero effects reasonably well. However, limited information estimates were far superior in detecting misspecified zero-effect hypotheses. We recommend limited information parameter estimation procedures over full information techniques for (a) testing specific causal hypotheses and (b) locating specific structural model misspecifications.

Disturbance Term Regression Test Procedures for Recursive and Nonrecursive Models: Solution From Intercorrelation Matrices.

The logic and procedures underlying a disturbance term regression test of logical consistency for structural models are reviewed for recursive and nonrecursive designs. It is shown that in a simple three-variable, complete mediational case the test procedure is mathematically equivalent to a part correlation. Procedures are outlined that allow researchers to conduct disturbance term regression tests using only the matrix of intercorrelations among structural variables. General procedures are outlined (a) to test mediational hypotheses in recursive designs and (b) to test for omitted cross effects in nonrecursive designs. The relative virtues of the disturbance term regression test and other fit indices are discussed.