Comparative Performance of Estimation Maximization Among Residual Estimators: A Structural Equation Modelling Perspective

Abstract

As the concept of methodology has advanced, varied methods of estimating residuals have been developed including regression method, Bartlett’s method and Anderson-Rubin’s method. The study utilized estimation maximization approach together with other methods of estimating residuals under the structural equation model. The results showed that the strength of the existing methods in structural equation modelling are the weaknesses of the estimation maximization method, and vice versa. It was, therefore, found that from the comparative model fit information that the Bartlett’s based method gave better residual parameter estimates compared to the Regression based and the Anderson Rubin based methods. However, the estimation maximization method gave better residual parameter estimates than the other three existing methods; the Regression, Bartlett’s and the Anderson Rubin based methods.