Hi @ron4, your note wasn't sent to @pieterjanvc, but I can try answer some of your questions: The cronbach function takes a table as input and gives a number as output, but lm.beta() gives a model as output, and rinvgamma() which you asked about here, gives random values from a ditribution. So to asnwer you question, I would say that, no, you can't change 'beta' or 'gamma' for 'alpha' and have the calculations work out -- that's why I had asked what your motivation was for using the beta- and gamma-related commands. What were you hoping to use them for?