Structural equation modeling (SEM) has become a quasi-standard in marketing and management research when it comes to analyzing the cause-effect relations between latent constructs. For most researchers, SEM is equivalent to carrying out covariance-based SEM (CB-SEM). While marketing researchers...

Applications of the partial least squares (PLS) path modeling approach — which have gained increasing dissemination in business research — usually build on the assumption that the data stem from a single population. However, in empirical applications, this assumption of homogeneity is...

Most methodological fields undertake regular critical reflections to ensure rigorous research and publication practices, and, consequently, acceptance in their domain. Interestingly, relatively little attention has been paid to assessing the use of partial least squares structural equation...

Rigdon’s (2012) thoughtful article argues that PLS-SEM should free itself from CB-SEM. It should renounce all mechanisms, frameworks, and jargon associated with factor models entirely. In this comment, we shed further light on two subject areas on which Rigdon (2012) touches in his discussion...

This article introduces and motivates an exchange of thoughts on the paper by Edward E. Rigdon in the first of two Long Range Planning special issues on partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) in strategic management published in 2012 and 2013. For 30 years, there has been a...