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Factor Analysis and Psychometrika: Major Developments

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2025

Stanley A. Mulaik
Stanley A. Mulaik*
Affiliation:
Georgia Institute of Technology
*
Requests for reprints should be sent to Stanley A. Mulaik, School of Psychology, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332.
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Abstract

Papers on factor analysis appearing in Psychometrika reflect the initial efforts of the Thurstonians to reformulate psychology as a quantitative science. The Thurstonians' emphasis on the development of factor analysis as an exploratory methodology was not new with them but was taken from British statisticians and psychologists who preceded them, whose literature the Thurstonians otherwise tended to ignore. The Thurstonians' rejection of general factors and focus on rotation to simple structure reflected an attempt to avoid statistical artifact and to identify factors with psychological substance. Much of the literature on factor analysis in Psychometrika concerned solving technical problems in the exploratory factor analysis method. Factor analysis took a major shift in direction in the 1970's with the development of confirmatory methodologies, many of which now receive greater attention than the method of exploratory factor analysis, most of the problems of which are now resolved.

Keywords

factor analysishistoryPsychometrikamultivariate statistics

Information

Type
50th Anniversary Section
Information
Psychometrika , Volume 51 , Issue 1 , March 1986 , pp. 23 - 33
Copyright
Copyright © 1986 The Psychometric Society

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