Título: Raymond Cattell
Seção: Factor analysis
Background: Raymond Bernard Cattell (20 March 1905 - 2 February 1998) was a British and American psychologist, known for his psychometric research into intrapersonal psychological structure. His work also explored the basic dimensions of personality and temperament, the range of cognitive abilities, the dynamic dimensions of motivation and emotion, the clinical dimensions of abnormal personality, patterns of group syntality and social behavior, applications of personality research to psychotherapy and learning theory, predictors of creativity and achievement, and many multivariate research methods including the refinement of factor analytic methods for exploring and measuring these domains. Cattell authored, co-authored, or edited almost 60 scholarly books, more than 500 research articles, and over 30 standardized psychometric tests, questionnaires, and rating scales. According to a widely cited ranking, Cattell was the 16th most eminent, 7th most cited in the scientific journal literature, and among the most productive, but controversial psychologists of the 20th century.

Conteúdo: Cattell noted that in the hard sciences such as chemistry, physics, astronomy, as well as in medical science, unsubstantiated theories were historically widespread until new instruments were developed to improve scientific observation and measurement. In the 1920s, Cattell worked with Charles Spearman who was developing the new statistical technique of factor analysis in his effort to understand the basic dimensions and structure of human abilities. Factor analysis became a powerful tool to help uncover the basic dimensions underlying a confusing array of surface variables within a particular domain.  Factor analysis was built upon the earlier development of the correlation coefficient, which provides a numerical estimate of the degree to which variables are "co-related". For example, if "frequency of exercise" and "blood pressure level" were measured on a large group of people, then intercorrelating these two variables would provide a quantitative estimate of the degree to which "exercise" and "blood pressure" are directly related to each other. Factor analysis performs complex calculations on the correlation coefficients among the variables within a particular domain (such as cognitive ability or personality trait constructs) to determine the basic, unitary factors underlying the particular domain.  While working at the University of London with Spearman exploring the number and nature of human abilities, Cattell postulated that factor analysis could be applied to other are

user: What is the relation between Raymond and Factor analysis?

assistant: In the 1920s, Cattell worked with Charles Spearman who was developing the new statistical technique of factor analysis in his effort

user: What is the purpose of the effort applied?

assistant: Factor analysis became a powerful tool to help uncover the basic dimensions underlying a confusing array of surface variables within a particular domain.

user: How do they come about with the factor analysis?

assistant: Factor analysis was built upon the earlier development of the correlation coefficient, which provides a numerical estimate of the degree to which variables are "co-related".