Abstract:

The application of statistical methods in ecological researches is more and more extensive, and it is very important for improvement and development of ecologica science. However, there are some mistakes when statistical methods are applied to ecological researches, 1) Regression analysis: correlation index, R², was incorrectly used to test whether a simple regression equation was significant or not. Correlation coefficient, r, was inappropriately used to describe the significance of curve regression equations. Moreover, multiple linear regression equation was only tested by analysis of variance (ANOVA), but each regression coefficient in the equation was not tested; 2) ANOVA. t_test was applied inappropriately to test significance of the means of all treatments when the treatments in an experiment were more than 2. The reasons for these mistakes were investigated and methods to avoid these mistakes were introduced.

Key words: Ecological researches, Statistical methodology, Mistake