Developments in Environmental Modelling Volume 20, 1998, Pages 481-574
Chapter 10 - Interpretation of ecological structures Show more https://doi.org/10.1016/S0167-8892(98)80062-6
Get rights and content
Publisher Summary This chapter discusses the methods used for interpreting ecological structures. During interpretation, the analysis of the structure must be conducted with care, using measures of association that are appropriate to the objects and descriptors of the data matrix and analytical methods that correspond to the objectives of the study. The interpretation of structures, in ecology, has three main objectives: explanation, forecasting, and prediction. The chapter discusses the combined use of clustering and ordination to optimize the partition of objects or descriptors. In addition, the chapter reviews the numerical methods available for interpretation of ecological structures. It provides an account of different types of regression and other scatterplot smoothing methods. The chapter also discusses the path analysis, which is used to assess causal relationships among quantitative descriptors. Regression and path analysis are restricted to the interpretation of univariate response variables. The methods developed for the comparison of resemblance matrices are the Mantel test and derived forms (partial Mantel test, multiple regression on distance matrices); the analysis of similarities (ANOSIM); and Procrustes analysis. The chapter concludes with an account of the 4thcorner problems.
Previous chapter
Next chapter
Choose an option to locate/access this article: Check if you have access through your login credentials or your institution.
