Finding the most 'important' variable

[gheelengooi]

I am trying to analyze a junk of landslide data (landslide @ different locations) to see which factor has the most effect on landslide, that includes slope angle, rainfall intensity etc etc, which sums up to 7 to 8 of them.

I am wondering which kind of analysis I should adapt in order to do that. I am thinking of using multiple regression analysis and sensitivity analysis but I am still trying to figure it out.

Any good suggestion for that?

(I use Matlab and Excel)

 

[JeSuisConf]

Well, nobody here can do your research or give much help without knowing anything about it, but you might start by reading about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal_component_analysis" .