The Olinger Group

Used to discover the relative importance and drivers of overall concepts (satisfaction) and other ideas.

• Causal modeling: Based on relational statistics like correlation-regression analysis.  Often called driver analysis, it is used to determine which items are “drivers” of an overall concept or other observables, and their relative importance in affecting the concept.
• Path modeling: A multi-step process used when there is more than one endogenous or dependent variable in a complex process or system.  It evaluates the effects of drivers on each endogenous variable that is in turn a driver (is exogenous to) other endogenous variables in the complex process or system.  This allows for the identification of both direct and indirect effects of each variable on all other variables in the model.
• Structural equation modeling: The most sophisticated method for modeling processes and systems.  It simultaneously does multiple indicator measurement and dimension reduction (like factor analysis) and path modeling analysis to discover the latent dimensions and their relative importance on a process of system.