Hi Joao, this is my first post of stats.
I think that they are sugesting Poisson or Negative Binomial distribution
because they are discrete distribution as is your data. You can use Normal
distribution as aproximation as it has a continous distribution.

Hope that helps
Bye
Luciano


2009/10/1 Canning-Clode, Joao <Canning-ClodeJ@si.edu>

> Hi all,
>
> 1st time user here!
> I am an ecologist working with marine fouling assemblages. I just got a
> paper back for revision. I am working with count data (species richness). I
> have used a linear model but the reviewers are recommending the use of
> negative binomial or Poisson. As far as I could understand from the
> literature these complex models should be used and the distribution is
> skewed left (lots of zeros). Well, my data is perfectly normal distributed.
> My main question is: can I still use negative binomial or poisson even if my
> data is normal? Does that make sense?
>
> Thanks in advance
>
> João Canning Clode, PhD
> Postdoctoral Fellow
> Marine Invasions Research Lab
> Smithsonian Environmental Research Center
> 647 Contees Wharf Road
> Edgewater, MD 21037
>
> Email: canning-clodej@si.edu
> Web: www.canning-clode.com
> Tel: 443-482-2354
>
> _______________________________________________
> R-sig-ecology mailing list
> R-sig-ecology@r-project.org
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-sig-ecology
>

	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]

