On the Applicability of Latent Variable Modeling to Research System Data

In this note, we discuss the applicability of latent variable models as a tool in analyzing the structure of a research system. We consider whether tensor methods, especially Parallel Factor Analysis, are appropriate for the description of the personnel structure and publication results of different scientific disciplines in different universities. As the measured variables (personnel structure and publications) interact with both the universities and the disciplines, it is useful to view the data as a tensor. Our preliminary results suggest that tensor methods are indeed able to find meaningful structure in such data.