The Structure of Personal Characteristics

The purpose of this book is to show that the prevalent view of personal characteristics, which has been influenced to a large extent by factor analysis, may not be the soundest or the most useful. Structural equation modeling entails a more comprehensive approach to modeling relationships between variables than factor analysis and enables one to test alternative models to the factor model in accounting for these relationships.

In this work this proposition is demonstrated by drawing on the research the authors have conducted in three important domains of personal characteristics--abilities, personality disorders, and self-attitudes. The authors' discoveries in these areas have far-reaching and innovative implications not only for psychological and psychosocial theory but also for applied areas such as teaching, psychotherapy, and communication.

DAVID M. ROMNEY is Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Calgary in Alberta, Canada. For the past twenty-two years he has taught full-time, and prior to that he practiced as a school psychologist and clinical psychologist.

JOHN M. BYNNER is Professor of Social Statistics and Director of the Social Statistics Research Unit at City University, London. He has also has been the national coordinator of the U.K. Economic and Social Research Council 16-19 Initiative and is presently Director of the National Child Development Study and the 1970 British Cohort Study.