1. Demonstration of Factor Analysis

2. Shy, Organized, Nosy, Warm, Reserved, Impulsive, Obedient, Neat, Punctual, Curious, Sociable, Artistic, Methodical, Modest, Loving, Hostile, Fearful, Jealous, Efficient, Messy, Dominant, Active, Dynamic, Flexible, Arrogant, Polite, Intellectual, Creative, Dominant Sort these words in groups so that related words are in the same group and unrelated words are in different groups. Form as many groups as you want.

3. How many people put each of these together. 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. Messy- 2. Efficient??- 3. Punctual???? - 4. Friendly ??????- 5. Warm ?? ???? ?? - 6. Arrogant ??????????-

4. Could lead to this correlation table… 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 1. Messy- 2. Efficient-.40 - 3. Punctual-.60.40 - 4. Friendly.10.05.00 - 5. Warm.05.00.05.70 - 6. Arrogant.10.05.00-.60-.70-

5. Results of correlation table/show of hands Factor I: +Punctual, +Efficient, -Messy Factor II: +Friendly, +Warm, - Arrogant Similarly, factor analysis would find two factors Factor=a variable that captures the relations between similar/related items

6. What is Factor Analysis It looks for structure…by identifying what things/variables go together and what do not go together Can do it better than human observation for large number of variables and large number of cases

7. What can we learn from factor analyses? It does not provide label for its factors. Factor names are researcher’s inventions. Recall, in the example we found two factors: Factor I: +Punctual, +Efficient, -Messy Factor II: +Friendly, +Warm, - Arrogant So We could call the first factor, Conscientiousness & the second factor Agreeableness

8. So what is Factor Analysis Factor analysis is a complex mathematical procedure to separate related variables from unrelated variables. Can do it better than human observation for large number of variables and large number of cases

9. Factor Loadings Factor analysis is designed to find a small number of factors. To achieve this goal it disregards some valid individual differences. Factor loadings are correlations between a factor and a measured individual difference dimension. Agreeableness(explain.V.) Warm.7049% Friendly.6036% Arrogant -.6036%

10. Limitations of Factor analyses Factor analysis also does not provide a clear answer to the number of factors. e.g., in personality research different researchers have argued for different numbers of factors but the Five Factor Model has become the dominant classification system in the past 20 years.

11. In summary…. Factor analysis is another way to condense large amounts of observations (e.g., questions) to a manageable number of concepts (dimensions) For a real-world application read Gladwell’s article From the Oct 16, 2006 Issue of the New Yorker on how to do a factor analysis of Movie Stories!