Standardized effect size measures for mediation analysis in cluster-randomized trials

This article presents 3 standardized effect size measures to use when sharing results of an analysis of mediation of treatment effects for cluster-randomized trials. The authors discuss 3 examples of mediation analysis (upper-level mediation, cross-level mediation, and cross-level mediation with a contextual effect) with demonstration of the calculation and interpretation of the effect size measures using a simulated dataset and an empirical dataset from a cluster-randomized trial of peer tutoring. SAS syntax is provided for parametric percentile bootstrapped confidence intervals of the effect sizes. The use of any of the 3 standardized effect size measures depends on the nature of the inference the researcher wishes to make within a single site, across the broad population, or at the site level.