The Current State and Future of Factor Analysis in Personality Disorder Research

The major debates in the personality disorder (PD) field center on the structure of personality pathology. Factor analysis is designed to elucidate the underlying structure of observed phenomena. Therefore, factor analysis has already played a major role in the debates about the structure of PD, and will continue to be an often-used and indispensable tool moving forward. However, misconceptions about the utility and interpretation of factor analyses abound. The purpose of this article is to provide a conceptual primer on available factor analytic techniques and how they have been applied in PD research, and to highlight novel ways of using factor analysis moving forward. The techniques reviewed include exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis, exploratory structural equation modeling, multilevel structural equation modeling, and person-specific (i.e., P-technique) factor analysis. Additionally, the notion that exploratory and confirmatory factor analytic approaches lie on an exploratory to confirmatory spectrum is introduced. Examples from the published literature are used to illustrate key points.