Dear Friends
Have you heard of the term Exploratory SEM?
It is considered as an improvement over the traditional CFA.
Particularly for the multidimensional constructs, traditional CFAs fail to meet good measurement standards: goodness of fit, measurement invariance, lack of differential item functioning, and well-differentiated factors that support discriminant validity. Part of the problem is undue reliance on overly restrictive CFAs in which each item loads on only one factor.
The two terms CFA and ESEM differ in the following ways:
- Exploratory Structural Equation Modeling (ESEM) integrates exploratory and confirmatory approaches within SEM.
- Unlike CFA, ESEM does not force all cross-loadings to zero. Rather, it allows small, theoretically meaningful cross-loadings across factors.
- This reduces the measurement model misspecification common in CFA.
- ESEM typically produces better overall model fit indices.
- Factor correlations are less inflated compared to CFA.
- It is especially useful when constructs are conceptually related.
- ESEM is ideal for newly developed or adapted measurement scales.
Overall, ESEM offers more realistic and theoretically defensible measurement models.
Read more about E-SEM
I recently studied this concept and explained it in this video:
Happy Learning
Neeraj