Testing for the indirect effect under the null for genome-wide mediation analyses.

ABSTRACT: Mediation analysis helps researchers assess whether part or all of an exposure's effect on an outcome is due to an intermediate variable. The indirect effect can help in designing interventions on the mediator as opposed to the exposure and better understanding the outcome's mechanisms. Mediation analysis has seen increased use in genome-wide epidemiological studies to test for an exposure of interest being mediated through a genomic measure such as gene expression or DNA methylation (DNAm). Testing for the indirect effect is challenged by the fact that the null hypothesis is composite. We examined the performance of commonly used mediation testing methods for the indirect effect in genome-wide mediation studies. When there is no association between the exposure and the mediator and no ass

SUBMITTER: Barfield R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5696067 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature