Distance‐based multivariate analyses confound location and dispersion effects

• Published in: Methods in ecology and evolution Vol. 3; no. 1; pp. 89 - 101
• Main Authors: Warton, David I., Wright, Stephen T., Wang, Yi
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Oxford, UK Blackwell Publishing Ltd 01.02.2012; John Wiley & Sons, Inc
• Subjects: Bray–Curtis distance; community composition; generalised linear models; mean–variance relationship; Multivariate analysis; multi‐dimensional scaling; PERMANOVA; Regression analysis; SIMPER; species‐by‐site data

Summary 1. A critical property of count data is its mean–variance relationship, yet this is rarely considered in multivariate analysis in ecology. 2. This study considers what is being implicitly assumed about the mean–variance relationship in distance‐based analyses – multivariate analyses based on...