ABSTRACT
Factor analysis methods have been traced back to 1904 and Charles Spearman's principal components model (Pohlmann 2004). Through the 1970s, nearly all factor analysis literature was concerned with exploratory factor analysis applications (EFA). However, from the 1980s onward, there has been significantly more interest in the confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) model (Long 1983). The objective of CFA is related to hypothesis testing. The researcher hypothesizes that a number of items or variables are collectively related. He or she can run a factor analysis on the data to test whether the relationships exist as they were hypothesized.
