Mothers' views tended to be the most shared, whereas fathers' were the least shared. It also appeared to be the case that adolescents more than parents were sensitive to how partners elicited differentiation from others. Finally, as one person exhibited differentiated behavior, the other also tended to elicit the same behavior. In other words, differentiation begets differentiation. We concluded that these procedures provide a closer approximation of a system level analysis than other more commonly used analysis procedures.
Researchers often collect multiple observations from many individuals.
In this chapter we introduce the technique of multilevel modeling as a means for analyzing repeated measures data. We also introduce nontraditional estimation methods. We also consider the issue of pooling within and between slopes. In this article we discuss the conceptual meaning of partner effects, which occur when one person is affected by the behavior or characteristics of his or her partner. We show that partner effects can be used to validate the presence of a relationship and can elaborate the nature of that relationship.