Discriminant validity of formative constructs

[j_terstriep]

Dear PLS-Team,

In their recent article "A new criterion for assessing discriminant validity in variance-based structural equation modeling" (Henseler/Ringle/Sarstedt, 2015: 131) state:

Prior literature gives practically no recommendations on how to assess the discriminant validity of formatively measured constructs. One of the few exceptions is the research by Klein and Rai (2009), who suggest examining the crossloadings of formative indicators. Analogous to their reflective counterparts, formative indicators should correlate more highly with their composite construct score than with the composite score of other constructs. However, considering the poor performance of cross-loadings in our study, its use in formative measurement models appears questionable. Against this background, future research should seek alternative means to consider formatively measured constructs when assessing discriminant validity.

Does this mean one should refrain from using cross-loadings to assess formative constructs discriminant validity. And if so, have alternative measures already been developed in the meantime?

I would highly welcome your suggestions.

Best regards,
Judith

[cringle]

Discriminant validity has been suggested for reflective constructs. Here, the Fornell-Larcker criterion and the cross-loadings. The article you refer to shows that HTMT is advantageous.

The discriminant validity assessment is not a standard procedure for formative constructs. It would be nice to conduct further research into this direction but so far we are not aware of papers that provide suggestions in these regards (e.g., discriminant validity of composite indicator models).

Best
CR

[j_terstriep]

Dear Prof. Ringle,

many thanks for your reply.

Best regards,
Judith