Dear R-users, I am trying to analyse the data of the box 10.5 in the Biometry from Sokal and Rohlf (2001) using R. This is a three-level nested anova with equal sample size : 3 different treatments are compared ; 2 rats (coded 1 or 2) / treatment are studied ; 3 preparations (coded 1, 2 or 3) / rats are available ; 2 readings of the glycogen content / preparations are realised. Treatment is fixed whereas Rats (nested in Treatment) and Prep (nested in Rats) are random effects. According to a previous discussion found in the R-help archives (January 2007), I have tried the following formula :
box105.lme<-lme(content~treatment, box105.gd, random=~1|rats/prep)
However, the formula summary(box105.lme) gives wrong estimates for the variance components (rats within treatments, prep within rats, readings within preps) ! Moreover the numbers of rats and preps are also wrong, with respectively 2 and 6 instead of 3*2=6 and 6* 3=18 ! I have also tried the following formula :
box105bis.lme<-lme(content~treatment, box105.gd,
random=~1|treatment/rats/prep In this case, the variance components as well as the number of rats and preps are correct. Nevertheless, I have two new problems : (1) the treatment is first treated as a random effects although it is fixed ! (2) there is a serious problem of df when treatment is then treated as a fixed effect (18 df for the intercept and 0 for the two other treatments !) What's wrong ? I didn't find such design and data in Pinheiro and Bates (2000) Thanks for your help, Nicolas