LISREL 8.54: A program for structural equation modelling with latent variables

Abstract

LISREL 8.54 is a computer program originally designed for estimation of a general structural equation model developed by Karl Joreskog in the early 1970s (Joreskog, 1973). Its current version, LISREL 8.54, is an advanced statistical program for multivariate analysis of linear systems with latent or unobserved variables, econometric structural equation systems, and a variety of factor analytic methods and covariance structure models. Recent developments also include powerful procedures for analysis with non-metric variables including latent variable models with ordinal indicators. The core code of the program is written in FORTRAN, but over the last decade its current vendor, Scientific Software International Inc. (SSI), developed an impressive interactive visual interface in C/C CC that made LISREL one of the most user-friendly multivariate analysis packages available. While preserving its raw power and flexibility, this multi-language architecture, however, contributed to instability problems associated with the 8.50/8.51 versions. Several subsequent upgrades have resulted in the 8.54 release that now more closely resembles the power and reliability of the earlier versions of this program. The LISREL 8.54 program (LISWIN32.EXE) is a 32-bit Windows application which interfaces with several modules, the main two of which are LISREL (LISREL85.EXE) and PRELIS (PRELIS25.EXE).1 PRELIS was developed later than LISREL with the main purpose of providing a pre-processor and data transformation front-end to LISREL.