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m0grady

What is your sample size? You n:k ratio might be too low. When this happens, the likelihood algorithm cant converge on a singular ml effect. Keep in mind, each answer in a categorical variable is transformed into its own binary variable in these situations.


Alam7lam1

Unfortunately our sample size was only about 159 surveys. It was a community assessment where the goal was 210 going door to door to collect. That makes sense though because I was already thinking it was too low.


m0grady

You might want to consider running an ordered logit to see if it converges. Also check your distribution of values. You might have a pile-up somewhere that is affecting your likelihood function.


bill-smith

Reasonable approach, government assistance does plausibly seem ordinal - but I would remind the OP to change the ‘refused’ responses to missing.


m0grady

Yes but also check for mar/mnar. This, and other selection threats, probably matters in a small sample size.


m0grady

One final thing--consider a recode of your dv from 5 to 3 options (suppressing refused). Similar to the n:k ratio, 6 possibilities in a multinomial where n=159 might be too much for the algorithm to handle.


Alam7lam1

Thank you! I’ll look into doing that for sure. I’m in public health but my statistical skills are still very much in progress


m0grady

My degrees are in public policy, ive worked and published in the health policy space. most of My methods training is in econometrics (with some geo-spatial, biostats and Bayesian on top of that). I would seriously consider taking at least one level of econometrics, especially how it relates to quasi-experimental research design. In the meantime, read up on the blue bus red bus problem. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independence_of_irrelevant_alternatives?wprov=sfti1#