An effect size for comparing the strength of morphological integration across studies.

ABSTRACT: Understanding how and why phenotypic traits covary is a major interest in evolutionary biology. Biologists have long sought to characterize the extent of morphological integration in organisms, but comparing levels of integration for a set of traits across taxa has been hampered by the lack of a reliable summary measure and testing procedure. Here, we propose a standardized effect size for this purpose, calculated from the relative eigenvalue variance, V r e l $V_{rel}$ . First, we evaluate several eigenvalue dispersion indices under various conditions, and show that only V r e l $V_{rel}$ remains stable across samples size and the number of variables. We then demonstrate that V r e l $V_{rel}$ accurately characterizes input patterns of covariation, so long as redundant dimensions

SUBMITTER: Conaway MA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9804739 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature