Developing and assessing a density surface model in a Bayesian hierarchical framework with a focus on uncertainty: insights from simulations and an application to fin whales (Balaenoptera physalus)
| Autor: | Elizabeth A. Josephson, Lance P. Garrison, Paul B. Conn, Debra L. Palka, Douglas B Sigourney, Samuel Chavez-Rosales |
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| Jazyk: | angličtina |
| Rok vydání: | 2020 |
| Předmět: |
0106 biological sciences
Conservation Biology Bayesian probability lcsh:Medicine Marine Biology Bayesian inference 010603 evolutionary biology 01 natural sciences General Biochemistry Genetics and Molecular Biology Overdispersion Tweedie distribution Density surface model Statistics Jagam Mathematics Distance sampling Mathematical model Ecology Population Biology 010604 marine biology & hydrobiology General Neuroscience lcsh:R Generalized Additive Model (GAM) General Medicine Variance (accounting) Fin whales Natural Resource Management Bayesian model General Agricultural and Biological Sciences Count data |
| Zdroj: | PeerJ PeerJ, Vol 8, p e8226 (2020) |
| ISSN: | 2167-8359 |
| Popis: | Density surface models (DSMs) are an important tool in the conservation and management of cetaceans. Most previous applications of DSMs have adopted a two-step approach to model fitting (hereafter referred to as the Two-Stage Method), whereby detection probabilities are first estimated using distance sampling detection functions and subsequently used as an offset when fitting a density-habitat model. Although variance propagation techniques have recently become available for the Two-Stage Method, most previous applications have not propagated detection probability uncertainty into final density estimates. In this paper, we describe an alternative approach for fitting DSMs based on Bayesian hierarchical inference (hereafter referred to as the Bayesian Method), which is a natural framework for simultaneously propagating multiple sources of uncertainty into final estimates. Our framework includes (1) a mark-recapture distance sampling observation model that can accommodate two team line transect data, (2) an informed prior for the probability a group of animals is at the surface and available for detection (i.e. surface availability) (3) a density-habitat model incorporating spatial smoothers and (4) a flexible compound Poisson-gamma model for count data that incorporates overdispersion and zero-inflation. We evaluate our method and compare its performance to the Two-Stage Method with simulations and an application to line transect data of fin whales (Balaenoptera physalus) off the east coast of the USA. Simulations showed that both methods had low bias ( |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
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