Integrating the underlying structure of stochasticity into community ecology

Stochasticity is a core component of ecology, as it underlies key processes that structure and create variability in nature. Despite its fundamental importance in ecological systems, the concept is often treated as synonymous with unpredictability in community ecology, and studies tend to focus on s...

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Published in:Ecology (Durham) Vol. 101; no. 2; pp. 1 - 17
Main Authors: Shoemaker, Lauren G., Sullivan, Lauren L., Donohue, Ian, Cabral, Juliano S., Williams, Ryan J., Mayfield, Margaret M., Chase, Jonathan M., Chu, Chengjin, Harpole, W. Stanley, Huth, Andreas, HilleRisLambers, Janneke, James, Aubrie R. M., Kraft, Nathan J. B., May, Felix, Muthukrishnan, Ranjan, Satterlee, Sean, Taubert, Franziska, Wang, Xugao, Wiegand, Thorsten, Yang, Qiang, Abbott, Karen C.
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: United States John Wiley and Sons, Inc 01.02.2020
Ecological Society of America
John Wiley and Sons Inc
Subjects:
autocorrelation
Community ecology
CONCEPTS & SYNTHESIS
demographic stochasticity
Demographics
distribution
diversity
Ecological monitoring
Ecology
Ecosystem
environmental stochasticity
Mathematical models
Models, Biological
Models, Theoretical
Population Dynamics
Population levels
scale
Stochastic Processes
Stochasticity
uncertainty
diversity
environmental stochasticity
demographic stochasticity
scale
distribution
uncertainty
population dynamics
autocorrelation
ISSN:0012-9658, 1939-9170, 1939-9170
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:Stochasticity is a core component of ecology, as it underlies key processes that structure and create variability in nature. Despite its fundamental importance in ecological systems, the concept is often treated as synonymous with unpredictability in community ecology, and studies tend to focus on single forms of stochasticity rather than taking a more holistic view. This has led to multiple narratives for how stochasticity mediates community dynamics. Here, we present a framework that describes how different forms of stochasticity (notably demographic and environmental stochasticity) combine to provide underlying and predictable structure in diverse communities. This framework builds on the deep ecological understanding of stochastic processes acting at individual and population levels and in modules of a few interacting species. We support our framework with a mathematical model that we use to synthesize key literature, demonstrating that stochasticity is more than simple uncertainty. Rather, stochasticity has profound and predictable effects on community dynamics that are critical for understanding how diversity is maintained. We propose next steps that ecologists might use to explore the role of stochasticity for structuring communities in theoretical and empirical systems, and thereby enhance our understanding of community dynamics
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Corresponding Editor: Tom E. X. Miller.
ISSN:0012-9658
1939-9170
1939-9170
DOI:10.1002/ecy.2922