Introduction to the special section: Structural equation modeling in clinical research.

Clinical research hypotheses are becoming increasingly more complex and specific. As a result, clinical research studies often include multiple independent, intervening, and dependent variables in a single study. Nevertheless, a sampling of studies from 3 decades of research published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology reveals that the statistical models adopted by clinical researchers have failed to keep pace with the increasing complexity and specificity of hypotheses and research designs. This article introduces a special section on structural equation modeling, a statistical model well suited for complex and specific hypothesis tests in clinical research studies that include many variables.