Read more
It needs no great scientific insight to see that such multitudinously multi variate subjects as psychology, physiology, sociology, and history need multivariate methods. As this book may show, those methods-multivari ate analysis of variance, regression analysis, typal and discriminant func tion analysis, multidimensional scaling, and factor analysis-belong to a single structural arch which bears up conceptual and causal understanding in all these subjects. But factor analysis is the keystone of that arch. Since factor analysis has itself developed fantastically in thirty years [my first small book (Cattell, 1952b) could almost cover the field in a few chap ters!] , this book confines itself to that subject, with only brief connecting asides on the related areas. The purpose of a preface is to permit more personal comments and to explain why the design is what it is. Among the former the author often apologizes for writing in an already crowded library shelf, and, having con fessed the crime, thanks his friends for their connivance. The area already enjoys a truly excellent array of books, from extremely good elementary introductions by Child, Henrysson, Lawlis, and Chatfield, through the workbook emphasis of Fruchter, and the intermediates of Guertin and Bailey and Comrey, to the comprehensive technical works of Anderson, Ahmavaara, Gorsuch, Harman, Horst, Lawley and Maxwell, Mulaik, Rao, Rummel, and Van de Geer, not to mention the undating books by Burt, Thomson, and Thurstone.
List of contents
I.- 1 The Position of Factor Analysis in Psychological Research.- 2 Extracting Factors: The Algebraic Picture.- 3 Rotating Factors: The Geometric Picture.- 4 Fixing the Number of Factors: TheScientific Model 52.- 5 Fixing the Number of Factors: The Most Practicable Psychometric Procedures.- 6 The Theory of Unique Rotational Resolution by Confactor, Procrustes, and Simple Structure Principles.- 7 The Techniques of Simple Structure Rotation.- 8 More Refined Issues in Rotation and the Use of Oblique Factors.- 9 Higher-Order Factors: Models and Formulas.- 10 The Identification and Interpretation of Factors.- II.- 11 Factor Measures: Their Construction, Scoring, Psychometric Validity, and Consistency.- 12 Broader Experimental Designs and Uses: The Data Box and the New Techniques.- 13 Varieties of Factor Models in Relation to Scientific Models.- 14 Distribution, Scaling, and Significance Problems.- 15 Conducting a Factor Analytic Research: Strategy and Tactics.- Appendixes.- A. 1. Proposed Standard Notation: Rationale and Outline.- A.2. An Indexing System for Psychological Factors.- A.3. Note on Utility of Confactor Resolutions with Oblique Factors.- A.4. Transformations among SUD, SSA, and IIA Strata Models: Reversion from the Schmid-Leiman Matrix (IIA).- A.5. A Practicable Minimum List of Computer Programs.- A.6. Tables for Statistical Significance of Simple Structure.- A. 7. Tables for Significance of Congruence Coefficients in Factor Matching.- A.8. Tables for Significance of Salient Variable Similarity Index s.- References.- Author Index.
