Pitfalls of ignoring trait resolution when drawing conclusions about ecological processes
Pitfalls of ignoring trait resolution when drawing conclusions about ecological processes
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DOI：
10.1111/geb.13275
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发表时间：
2021-03-08
影响因子：
6.4
通讯作者：
Jarzyna, Marta A.
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Kohli, Brooks A.;Jarzyna, Marta A.
了解生态群落是如何组装的仍然是生态学中的一个重大挑战，直接影响着生物多样性的未来。基于特征的方法已经成为量化功能社区结构（收敛，发散）的主要方法，但其潜在的推断组装过程依赖于准确测量社区成员之间的功能差异。在这里，我们认为特质解析（从精细分辨率连续测量到粗糙分辨率二进制类别）仍然是一个被严重忽视的方法学变量，即使分类分类已知掩盖物种或个体之间的功能变异和膨胀功能冗余。创新我们提出了第一个详细的预测性状分辨率偏差，并通过模拟证明，越来越粗的分辨率性状的信号强度的失真如何从根本上改变功能结构模式和因果生态过程的解释（例如非生物过滤器，生物相互作用）。我们发现，粗糙的性状数据赋予不同的影响信号的分歧和收敛，这意味着生物相互作用的作用可能被低估时，使用粗糙的性状。此外，在某些系统中，粗糙的性状可能高估了性状收敛的强度，导致错误的支持非生物过程的主要驱动程序的社区组装或changes.Main结论装配过程的推论必须考虑到性状决议，以确保强大的结论，特别是大规模的比较社区组装和生物多样性变化的研究。尽管最近改进的收集和可用性的性状数据，巨大的差异继续存在类群之间的数量和可用性的连续性状，这是更难获得大量的物种比粗分类分配。基于我们的模拟，我们敦促考虑特质决议的设计和解释的社区组装研究，并提出了一套切实可行的解决方案，以解决陷阱的特质决议偏见。
Aim Understanding how ecological communities are assembled remains a grand challenge in ecology with direct implications for charting the future of biodiversity. Trait-based methods have emerged as the leading approach for quantifying functional community structure (convergence, divergence) but their potential for inferring assembly processes rests on accurately measuring functional dissimilarity among community members. Here, we argue that trait resolution (from finest-resolution continuous measurements to coarsest-resolution binary categories) remains a critically overlooked methodological variable, even though categorical classification is known to mask functional variability and inflate functional redundancy among species or individuals.Innovation We present the first detailed predictions of trait resolution biases and demonstrate, with simulations, how the distortion of signal strength by increasingly coarse-resolution traits can fundamentally alter functional structure patterns and the interpretation of causative ecological processes (e.g. abiotic filters, biotic interactions). We show that coarser trait data impart different impacts on the signals of divergence and convergence, implying that the role of biotic interactions may be underestimated when using coarser traits. Furthermore, in some systems, coarser traits may overestimate the strength of trait convergence, leading to erroneous support for abiotic processes as the primary drivers of community assembly or change.Main conclusions Inferences of assembly processes must account for trait resolution to ensure robust conclusions, especially for broad-scale studies of comparative community assembly and biodiversity change. Despite recent improvements in the collection and availability of trait data, great disparities continue to exist among taxa in the number and availability of continuous traits, which are more difficult to acquire for large numbers of species than coarse categorical assignments. Based on our simulations, we urge the consideration of trait resolution in the design and interpretation of community assembly studies and suggest a suite of practical solutions to address the pitfalls of trait resolution biases.