The procedures are limited to two latent classes, a taxon and a complement class. Furthermore, the procedures rely on covariances, that is they assume that the observed items are linearly associated. The procedures necessitate continuous observed indicators of the disorder to obtain the multiple partitions. Although extensions to yes/no symptoms have been proposed, these have been criticized (Maraun et al. 2003). Researchers are encouraged to apply the methods using each of the observed items once as the X variable for the repeated partitioning of the sample to check consistency. In case of large questionnaires it can be somewhat cumbersome to inspect the resulting large number of graphs. The procedures permit the calculation of class proportions and post-hoc computation of the means and variances in the taxon and the complement groups, along with post-hoc assignment of subjects to one of the two groups.
