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Exploratory Factor Analysis, Daire Hooper

Books/Book Chapters

Factor analysis examines the inter-correlations that exist between a large number of items (questionnaire responses) and in doing so reduces the items into smaller groups, known as factors. These factors contain correlated variables and are typically quite similar in terms of content or meaning. Unlike other methods discussed in this book, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) does not discriminate between variables on whether they are independent or dependent, but rather it is an interdependence technique that does not specify formal hypotheses. It is in this sense it is ‘exploratory’ in nature as it allows the researcher to determine the underlying dimensions …