ERIC Number: EJ1347837
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2022-Oct
Pages: 31
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0013-1644
EISSN: EISSN-1552-3888
Available Date: N/A
Exploratory Graph Analysis for Factor Retention: Simulation Results for Continuous and Binary Data
Cosemans, Tim; Rosseel, Yves; Gelper, Sarah
Educational and Psychological Measurement, v82 n5 p880-910 Oct 2022
Exploratory graph analysis (EGA) is a commonly applied technique intended to help social scientists discover latent variables. Yet, the results can be influenced by the methodological decisions the researcher makes along the way. In this article, we focus on the choice regarding the number of factors to retain: We compare the performance of the recently developed EGA with various traditional factor retention criteria. We use both continuous and binary data, as evidence regarding the accuracy of such criteria in the latter case is scarce. Simulation results, based on scenarios resulting from varying sample size, communalities from major factors, interfactor correlations, skewness, and correlation measure, show that EGA outperforms the traditional factor retention criteria considered in most cases in terms of bias and accuracy. In addition, we show that factor retention decisions for binary data are preferably made using Pearson, instead of tetrachoric, correlations, which is contradictory to popular belief.
Descriptors: Social Science Research, Research Methodology, Graphs, Factor Analysis, Simulation, Data Interpretation
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Evaluative
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
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