AbstractBeta-diversity was originally defined spatially, i.e., as variation in community composition among sites in a region. However, the concept of beta-diversity has since been expanded to temporal contexts. This is referred to as “temporal beta-diversity”, and most approaches are simply an extension of spatial beta-diversity.The persistence and turnover of individuals over time is a unique feature of temporal beta-diversity. Nakadai (2020) introduced the “individual-based beta-diversity” concept, and provided novel indices to evaluate individual turnover and compositional shift by comparing individual turnover between two periods at a given site. However, the proposed individual-based indices are applicable only to pairwise dissimilarity, not to multiple-temporal (or more generally, multiple-unit) dissimilarity.Here, individual-based beta-diversity indices are extended to multiple-unit cases.To demonstrate the usage the properties of these indices compared to average pairwise measures, I applied them to a dataset for a permanent 50-ha forest dynamics plot on Barro Colorado Island in Panama.Information regarding “individuals” is generally missing from community ecology and biodiversity studies of temporal dynamics. In this context, the method proposed here is expected to be useful for addressing a wide range of research questions regarding temporal changes in biodiversity, especially studies using individual-tracked forest monitoring data.
Temporal beta diversity of lake plants is determined by concomitant changes in environmental factors across decades
