Measurement and data analysis in research addressing health disparities in substance abuse

Abstract

This article describes concrete strategies for conducting substance abuse research with ethnic minorities. Two issues associated with valid analysis, measurement and data analysis, are included. Both empirical (e.g., confirmatory factor analysis, item response theory, and regression) and nonempirical (e.g., focus groups, expert panels, pilot studies, and translation equivalence) approaches to improve measures are described. A discussion of the use of norms and cutoff scores derived from a different ethnic group along with the effects of the ethnicity of the interviewer or coder on measurement is included. The section on data analysis describes why the use of race-comparison designs may lead to misleading conclusions. Alternatives to race-comparison analysis including within-group and between-group analyses are described. The shortcomings of combining ethnic groups for analyses are discussed. The article ends with a list of recommendations for research with ethnic minorities.

Does Cultural Adaptation Have a Role in Substance Abuse Treatment?

“…A comprehensive discussion of culturally competent research methods is beyond the scope of this article. However, we refer interested readers to our earlier discussion on two important issues: data analysis and measurement (Burlew, Feaster, Brecht, & Hubbard, 2009). In that article, we cautioned against the reliance on race comparison designs, the use of measures developed for another group without examining their appropriateness for a different ethnic group, the shortcomings associated with combining ethnic groups for data analysis rather than using designs that consider group diversity, and the need for within group studies to identify subgroup differences.…”

Measurement Invariance of the Short Inventory of Problems-Revised across African-American and Non-Latino White Substance Users

“…Determining measurement invariance of an instrument allows researchers to assess whether the construct and scores of a measure are similarly comprehended and measured across salient participant groups (e.g., based on race, ethnicity, gender, age, etc.). Measurement variance across cultural groups is theorized to result from (a) differences in participants’ environments to engage in certain behaviors or develop beliefs due to contextual differences, racism, or discrimination; (b) the language of the measure; or (c) cultural differences in norms and relevance of the constructs being assessed (Burlew, Feaster, Brecht, & Hubbard, 2009). In addition, participants from different cultural groups may respond to item content in dissimilar ways causing variable construct validity across groups (Allen & Walsh, 2000).…”

“…Measurement invariance estimates are more contemporary psychometric properties that expand on classical test theory and are important for further validating measures across diverse groups (Burlew et al, 2009; Meredith, 1993; Vandenberg & Lance, 2000; Widaman & Reise, 1997). Researchers often assume that adequate reliability estimates among groups are sufficient to obtain invariant measurement of a construct between groups.…”

“…The continued use of measures with different conceptual meaning across racial groups may render invalid analyses comparing such groups (Burlew et al, 2009). Conclusions drawn from invalid findings can lead to ineffective treatments and policy initiatives targeting substance use disorders (Ramirez, Ford, Steward, & Teresi, 2005).…”

“…Conclusions drawn from invalid findings can lead to ineffective treatments and policy initiatives targeting substance use disorders (Ramirez, Ford, Steward, & Teresi, 2005). Burlew et al (2009) and Feaster et al (2010) emphasized that any analysis of comparative effectiveness of substance abuse treatments across racial and ethnic groups should first ensure that measures used to assess treatment effectiveness have the same conceptual meaning or measurement invariance across groups. Thus, the current secondary analysis study aims to determine measurement invariance properties of a widely-used clinical assessment of the negative consequences of substance use (the Short Inventory of Problems–Revised or SIP-R; Kiluk, Dreifuss, Weiss, Morgenstern, & Carroll, 2012) across African American and non-Latino White participants in a randomized clinical trial in the National Institute on Drug Abuse Clinical Trials Network (NIDA-CTN).…”