A maximum likelihood latent variable regression model for multiple informants

Studies pertaining to childhood psychopathology often incorporate information from multiple sources (or informants). For example, measurement of some factor of particular interest might be collected from parents, teachers as well as the children being studied. We propose a latent variable modeling framework to incorporate multiple informant predictor data. Several related models are presented, and likelihood ratio tests are introduced to formally compare fit. The incorporation of partially observed subjects is addressed under a variety of missing data mechanisms. The methods are motivated by and applied to a study of the association of chronic exposure to violence on asthma in children.