Social Map of the City of Rio de Janeiro

Abstract

In a summarized and simplistic way, it can be said that factor analysis consists of an analytical treatment applied to a matrix of statistical data, where the rows correspond to observation units and the columns to a series of variables. The purpose is to transform it into another matrix, now formed by factors, each grouping the variables and assigning a correlation between them and the factor. The one that groups the highest number of variables with a high correlation will be the 1st factor, meaning it will contain a high percentage of the variance in the original data matrix. And so on. The advantage of the method is that, by considering the main factors, you work with a small number, while the original variables can number in the dozens.