The directional identification problem in Bayesian factor analysis: An ex-post approach

Christian Aßmann, Jens Boysen-Hogrefe and Markus Pape

No 2012-11, Economics Working Papers from Christian-Albrechts-University of Kiel, Department of Economics

Abstract: Due to their well-known indeterminacies, factor models require identifying assumptions to guarantee unique parameter estimates. For Bayesian estimation, these identifying assumptions are usually implemented by imposing constraints on certain model parameters. This strategy, however, may result in posterior distributions with shapes that depend on the ordering of cross-sections in the data set. We propose an alternative approach, which relies on a sampler without the usual identifying constraints. Identification is reached ex-post based on a Procrustes transformation. Resulting posterior estimates are ordering invariant and show favorable properties with respect to convergence and statistical as well as numerical accuracy.

Keywords: Bayesian Estimation; Factor Models; Multimodality; Ordering Problem; Orthogonal Transformation (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C11 C31 C38 C51 C52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2012
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