login

Detecting Latent Taxa: Monte Carlo Comparison of Taxometric, Mixture Model, and Clustering Procedures

Psychological ReportsPublished 1 August 2000
Charles M. Cleland, Louis Rothschild, Nick Haslam
Citations81
SJR quartileQ2
SJR score0.76
SNIP0.91

TL;DR

A Monte Carlo evaluation of four procedures for detecting taxonicity was conducted using artificial data sets that were either taxonic or nontaxonic.

Abstract

A Monte Carlo evaluation of four procedures for detecting taxonicity was conducted using artificial data sets that were either taxonic or nontaxonic. The data sets were analyzed using two of Meehl's taxometric procedures, MAXCOV and MAMBAC, Ward's method for cluster analysis in concert with the cubic clustering criterion and a latent variable mixture modeling technique. Performance of the taxometric procedures and latent variable mixture modeling were clearly superior to that of cluster analysis in detecting taxonicity. Applied researchers are urged to select from the better procedures and to perform consistency tests.

Keywords

Computer ScienceBiochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology