Charting fields and spaces quantitatively: from multiple correspondence analysis to categorical principal components analysis

Will Atkinson ()
Additional contact information
Will Atkinson: University of Bristol

Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology, 2024, vol. 58, issue 1, No 37, 829-848

Abstract: Abstract Multiple correspondence analysis (MCA) has started to gain popularity within sociology as a method of mapping ‘fields’ and ‘social spaces’ in the style of Pierre Bourdieu, its capacity to document multidimensional geometric relationships within data being a snug fit for the relational mode of thought he championed. There is a risk, however, of over-relying on MCA when the data suggest alternative methods and, as a result, drawing unsound conclusions. As a case in point, I take a recent analysis of political attitudes in the UK using MCA that drew bold inferences about the relationship with social class and reanalyse the same data with categorical principal components analysis (CatPCA). The results suggest the opposite conclusion to what was originally argued. I thus urge greater methodological flexibility and openness among those wishing to chart fields and social spaces and, more specifically, I make a case for CatPCA as a tool of geometric data analysis.

Keywords: Fields; Multiple correspondence analysis; Categorical principal components analysis; Geometric data analysis; Horseshoe effect (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11135-023-01669-w Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:qualqt:v:58:y:2024:i:1:d:10.1007_s11135-023-01669-w

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/11135

DOI: 10.1007/s11135-023-01669-w

Access Statistics for this article

Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology is currently edited by Vittorio Capecchi

More articles in Quality & Quantity: International Journal of Methodology from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().