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On Fitting the Truncated Lognormal Distribution to Species‐Abundance Data Using Maximum Likelihood Estimation
Author(s) -
Slocomb John,
Stauffer Barbara,
Dickson Kenneth L.
Publication year - 1977
Publication title -
ecology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.144
H-Index - 294
eISSN - 1939-9170
pISSN - 0012-9658
DOI - 10.2307/1939021
Subject(s) - log normal distribution , statistics , data set , maximum likelihood , mathematics , scale (ratio) , abundance (ecology) , grouped data , distribution (mathematics) , set (abstract data type) , ecology , computer science , biology , physics , mathematical analysis , programming language , quantum mechanics
The truncated lognormal distribution can be used to graduate certain species—abundance data, provided that estimates of the location and scale parameters are obtained. A computer program has been written which groups the data on a log 2 scale and numerically solves the maximum likelihood equations for this type of distribution. Results show that the estimates obtained by this method compared well with those of Hald and Cohen. Examples are presented using the diatom data of Hohn and Hellerman, and it is shown that a better fit is obtained by using the entire data set instead of selectively disregarding the most abundant tail intervals. Other published techniques for this type of analysis are also discussed.