Introduction

Discovering the nature of relationships between variables is a very important part of any scientific field. In the well-established sciences, the variables to be related are precisely defined and widely accepted by the scientific community as the important variables to study. The relationships of these variables with each other are frequently specified mathematically, and these mathematical relationships between variables in some cases are further organized into elaborate mathematical theories involving several interrelated variables. In the newer scientific fields the variables are less precisely defined, there is not so much agreement among scientists concerning what variables should be related to each other, and the nature of the relationships between variables is less clearly specified. Factor analysis represents a rapidly growing body of statistical methods that can be of great value in these less developed sciences. Factor analytic methods can help scientists to define their variables more precisely and decide what variables they should study and relate to each other in the attempt to develop their science to a higher level. Factor analytic methods can also help these scientists to gain a better understanding of the complex and poorly defined interrelationships among large numbers of imprecisely measured variables. The purpose of this book is to help the reader achieve some familiarity with these powerful methods of analysis.