Polychoric Correlation

[deleted_user]

Hello,

I ran a polychoric correlation and recieved the following output.

Polychoric Correlation Value = -0.1791 ASE = 0.0178

How can I interpret the ASE?

Thanks,

Kelly

[deleted_user]

Is it the asymptotic standard error of the correlation?

[deleted_user]

It is but, pardon the potentially stupid question, what does it signify in terms of the -.17 coefficient I got? Am I to assume that this coefficient is not significant?

[Dale]

I would say quite the opposite. The absolute value of the ratio of the polychoric correlation to its asymptotic standard error is 10. Assuming that the ratio follows a normal distribution, the probability that the polychoric correlation is zero in the population from which your sample is drawn is essentially zero.

That said, the correlation is small. The amount of shared variance is on the order of 3%. Whether this is meaningful is a totally different question than whether the correlation is significant.

[deleted_user]

Sorry for the late reply - but thanks very much!