Wenjing Huang
RAND Corporation
1776 Main Street
Santa Monica, CA 90407
whuang@rand.org
310. 393.0411 x7292
Education
2008–2013 Ph.D., Quantitative Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles.
Advisor: Dr. Peter M. Bentler
Dissertation title: PLSe: efficient estimators and tests for partial least squares in structural
equation modeling
Social Psychology Minor
2005–2008 M.A., Quantitative Psychology, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
Advisor: Dr. Patrick J. Curran
Thesis title: Three-way interactions with latent variables: A maximum likelihood approach
1998–2002 B.A., English Education, Soochow University, Suzhou, China.
Business Administration Minor
Internship
2012 World Health Organization, Geneva, Switzerland,
Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse.
Worked for building the Global Information System on Alcohol and Health and the Global status
report on alcohol and health 2014.
Professional Experience
2014-present, Associate Behavioral/Social Scientist, RAND Corporation.
Modeling Experience
Factor analysis, structural equation modeling/simultaneous equation models (SEM),
item response theory, latent growth models, multilevel/hierarchical modeling, mixture
modeling, meta-analysis, discriminant function analysis, cluster analysis, causal
inference, dynamic factor model, time series analysis, survival analysis, machine
learning and data mining.
Computing Experience
SAS, GAUSS, SPSS, SAS, R, CEFA, LISREL, Mplus, EQS, BILOG, MULTILOG, IRTPRO,
flexMIRT
Publications and Manuscripts
Stucky, B.D., Huang, W., & Edelen, M.O. (in press). The psychometric performance of the
PROMIS Smoking Assessment Toolkit: Comparisons of real-data CATs, short forms, and
mode of administration. Nicotine & Tobacco Research.
Bentler, P., & Huang, W. (2014). On components, latent variables, PLS and simple methods:
reactions to Ridgon’s rethinking of PLS. Long Range Planning, 47(3), 138–145.
Hussong, A. M., Huang, W., Serrano, D., Curran, P. J., & Chassin, L. (2012) Testing whether and
when parent alcoholism uniquely affects various forms of adolescent substance use.
Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 40(8), 1265–1276.
Hussong, A. M., Huang, W., Curran, P. J., Chassin, L., & Zucker, R. A. (2010). Parent alcoholism
impacts the severity and timing of children’s externalizing symptoms. Journal of
Abnormal Child Psychology, 38, 367–380.
Huang, W., & Bentler, P. (2009). Abstract: estimating latent variable interactions with binary
and ordinal data. Multivariate Behavioral Research, 44, 852–380.
Hussong, A. M., Bauer, D. J., Huang, W., Chassin, L., Sher, K. J., & Zucker, R. A. (2008).
Characterizing the life stressors of children of alcoholic parents. Journal of Family
Psychology, 22, 819–832.
Curran, P. J., Hussong, A. M., Cai, L., Huang, W., Chassin, L., Sher, K. J., & Zucker, R. A. (2008).
Pooling data from multiple prospective studies: The role of item response theory in
integrative analysis. Developmental Psychology, 44, 365–380.
Conference Presentations
Huang, W. Estimating latent variable interactions with binary and ordinal data. Presented at the
Society of Multivariate Experimental Psychology 2009 annual meeting.
Huang, W., Curran, P. J., Hussong, A. M. Disaggregating time-varying, proximal, and distal
effects of parent alcoholism on the externalizing symptoms: A time-varying covariate
model. Presented at the 2008 Conference on Developmental Psychopathology, Chapel Hill,
NC.
Huang, W. A brief overview of current methods of estimating latent variable interactions in
structural equation models. Presented at the 2007quantitative psychology colloquium,
Department of Psychology, UNC-CH.
Huang, W. Challenges in Measuring Substance Involvement. Presented at the 2006 quantitative
psychology colloquium, Department of Psychology, UNC-CH.
Research Experience
Research Staff (Sept 2014-present), RAND Corporation, “Development and Evaluation of a
Smoking Module for PROMIS” R01DA026943-01.
PROMIS, or the Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System is a
National Institutes of Health (NIH) Roadmap initiative that sets the standard for
modern behavioral health measurement development. PROMIS is at the forefront of
NIH efforts to fund research that advances behavioral health measurement by
developing new self-reporting tools based on the principles of item response theory
(IRT), a psychometric method common to educational testing and recently adapted for
use in the health outcomes field. The PROMIS Smoking Initiative, a project funded by
the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) to develop and evaluate IRT-based item
banks for assessing smoking behaviors and biopsychosocial correlates of smoking. My
duty on this project involves evaluating the technical quality of the Spanish translation
of the set of established item banks.
Research Assistant (2010-2013), University of California, Los Angeles, Center for Advancing
Longitudinal Drug Abuse Research(CALDAR).(Measurement of Recovery from Drug
Addiction)
CALDAR at UCLA is a multidisciplinary research unit with the goal of developing and
applying rigorous scientific approaches for advancing longitudinal research on drug
abuse and its interplay with HIV infection, drug treatment and other service systems.
The Measurement of Recovery from Drug Addiction project is a NIDA-funded (R01DA030466) project aiming at using Item Response Theory to help develop, evaluate, and
provide initial validity evidence for a measure of the multidimensionality of recovery.
My duty on this project involves conducting secondary analyses on data collected in the
national Drug Abuse Treatment Outcome Studies (DATOS) which contain a
comprehensive set of measures pertinent to recovery. My supervisor is Dr. Yih-Ing Hser.
Research Assistant (2005-2008), University of North Carolina, Department of Psychology. (Stress
and Substance Use in Children of Alcoholics).
The Stress and Substance Use in Children of Alcoholics project is a NIDA-funded (R01DA015398-01-04) project aiming at combining existing data from three major studies on
substance use and consequences, conducting innovative measurement modeling, and
examining individual trajectories over an age span from 2 to 33. We used tools such as
longitudinal modeling of adolescent’s stressful life-events via logistic regression by
generalized estimating equations. We also use tools such as item response theory,
longitudinal multiple imputation, and hierarchical linear models to look at patterns of
their drug and alcohol use. My duty in the research group also involved extensive SAS
data management, maintaining documentation and coordinating project progress with
other team members. My supervisor was Dr. Andrea Hussong.
Teaching Experience
Teaching Associate (2010-2012), University of California, Los Angeles, Department of Psychology,
(PSYC 100B, Research Methods in Psychology). Supervisor: Dr. Iris Firstenberg
Teaching Assistant (2010), University of California, Los Angeles, Department of Psychology,
(PSYC 10, Introductory Psychology). Supervisor: Dr. Nancy Woolf
Teaching Assistant (2009), University of California, Los Angeles, Department of Psychology,
(PSYC 100A, Psychological Statistics). Supervisors: Drs. Andrew Ainsworth and Sean McAuliffe
Teaching Assistant (2007), University of North Carolina, Department of Psychology, (PSYC 210,
Statistical Principles in Psychological Research). Supervisors: Drs. Mitchell Prinstein and Patrick
Curran