Factor structure of Hewitt-Flett Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale: Challenges and a systematic review of methods

Pages: 164-171
Sumit Kumar Das (Department of Biostatistics, National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS), Bengaluru, Karnataka)
Mariamma Philip (Department of Biostatistics, National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS), Bengaluru, Karnataka)
Binu V.S (Department of Biostatistics, National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS), Bengaluru, Karnataka)
Paulomi M. Sudhir (Department of Clinical Psychology, National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences, Bengaluru, Karnataka)

The Hewitt-Flett multidimensional perfectionism scale (HMPS) was developed three decades ago and is one of the most extensively used measures in investigation on perfectionism. However, its factor structure remains unconfirmed. The objective of the exercise is to critically review methodological issues of the existing literature on the factor structure of the HMPS. Acomprehensive literature review was carried out using Google scholar, PubMed, Psychinfo from July 1991 to May 2020using the keywords ‘perfectionism’, ‘Hewitt-Flett’, ‘Factor structure’, ‘construct validity’. Articles were included in the systematic review if they reported factor-structure validation of HMPS, article was in full length and accessible in full length were included in this study. The systematic search yielded five articles in the final review. The review indicated methodological concerns such as inadequate samples, ignoring gender differences, choice of incorrect matrix for factor analysis (FA), inappropriate extraction and rotation method in exploratory FA (EFA), incorrect estimation method and fit statistics in confirmatory FA (CFA). This study tried to address approaches that are likely to help researchers to arrive at the hypothesized factor structure of HMPS accurately in future.