AIC model selection and multimodel inference in behavioral ecology: some background, observations, and comparisons

• Published in: Behavioral ecology and sociobiology Vol. 65; no. 1; pp. 23 - 35
• Main Authors: Burnham, Kenneth P, Anderson, David R, Huyvaert, Kathryn P
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Berlin/Heidelberg : Springer-Verlag 2011; Springer; Springer-Verlag; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: AIC; Animal Ecology; Behavioral biology; Behavioral Sciences; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Ecological modeling; Empirical evidence; Entropy; Evidence; Inference; Kullback-Leibler information; Life Sciences; Male animals; Mating behavior; Model averaging; Model likelihoods; Model probabilities; Model selection; Modeling; Multimodel inference; Null hypothesis; P values; Probabilities; REVIEW; Statistical inference; Statistics; Variance analysis; Zoology; Model likelihoods; Model probabilities; Model selection; Model averaging; Evidence; AIC; Kullback–Leibler information; Multimodel inference

We briefly outline the information-theoretic (I-T) approaches to valid inference including a review of some simple methods for making formal inference from all the hypotheses in the model set (multimodel inference). The I-T approaches can replace the usual t tests and ANOVA tables that are so infere...