Is it possible to use Likert type Ordinal Data (depicting the Order not the interval) in factor analysis? Is it possible to carry out the same in SPSS?
You will find many papers here factor analysis is applied to likert scale questions, although it is intended to be used in scale data. I believe that it is ok to use factor analysis once you use a 7 or 10 point likert scale question and you check for the bell shape distribution. Spss uses the menu analyze->dimension reduction->factor.
Further material about this issue is provided in the following links: