出版社：Chinese Association for Aerosol Research in Taiwan
摘要：Aerosol and Air Quality Research is taking an editorial stand with regards to outdated data analysis methods, specifically principal component analysis (PCA) and related techniques and enrichment factors (EF). In both cases, they have been replaced with more quantitative data analytical tools that provide much greater information on sources of variation in the data. Enrichment factors were first used in the 1960s when we basically did not have computers. It was a simple way of using double ratios to see if an element were substantially enriched over crustal abundances that had been reported by one of several authors. However, the information is quite crude since it simply says that the element is higher than typical crustal values and does not account for local variations in elemental abundances. When we now have the capabilities to look at correlations, statistical assessment of differences in means or medians, etc., we should provide appropriate quantitative estimates of significance of differences among samples.
关键词：PCA; Principle component analysis; Enrichment Factors; Data Analysis.
