Do behavioural ecologists misuse the term multivariate?

This is a Preprint and has not been peer reviewed. This is version 3 of this Preprint. You must log in to post a comment. There are no comments or no comments have been made public for this article. This is a Preprint and has not been peer reviewed. This is version 3 of this Preprint. Add a Comment You must log in to post a comment. Comments There are no comments or no comments have been made public for this article. Clear communication of procedures and findings is critical for scientific progress. One problem facing many research disciplines is the incorrect labelling in the literature of multivariable (i.e. many Xs) statistical models as multivariate (many Ys). Multivariate and multivariable statistical models are different statistical approaches and should be described as such. I assessed whether behavioural ecologists fall victim to the mislabelling plaguing other disciplines by reviewing relevant papers published in Behavioral Ecology between 2013-2023. My review shows that approximately 30% of multivariable models were incorrectly labelled as multivariate. Although this error rate is less severe than in other scientific disciplines it is nonetheless greater than zero. https://doi.org/10.32942/X2F63V Ecology and Evolutionary Biology multivariable, multivariate, statistics Published: 2024-11-14 07:13 Last Updated: 2024-11-14 12:14 Conflict of interest statement: None Data and Code Availability Statement: Open data/code are not available. Language: English