Symmetrical and Non-symmetrical Variants of Three-Way Correspondence Analysis for Ordered Variables

Abstract

. In the framework of multi-way data analysis, this paper presents symmetrical and non-symmetrical variants of three-way correspondence analysis that are suitable when a three-way contingency table is constructed from ordinal variables. In particular, such variables may be modelled using general recurrence formulae to generate orthogonal polynomial vectors in-stead of singular vectors coming from one of the possible three-way extensions of the singular value decomposition. As we shall see, these polynomials, that until now have been used to decompose two-way contingency tables with ordered variables, also constitute an alternative orthogonal basis for modelling symmetrical, non-symmetrical associations and predictabilities in three-way contingency tables. Consequences with respect to modelling and graphing will be highlighted.