title: Brownian motion or Lévy walk? Stepping towards an extended statistical mechanics for animal locomotion.
abstract: Animals moving under the influence of spatio-temporal scaling and long-term memory generate a kind of space-use pattern that has proved difficult to model within a coherent theoretical framework. An extended kind of statistical mechanics is needed, accounting for both the effects of spatial memory and scale-free space use, and put into a context of ecological conditions. Simulations illustrating the distinction between scale-specific and scale-free locomotion are presented. The results show how observational scale (time lag between relocations of an individual) may critically influence the interpretation of the underlying process. In this respect, a novel protocol is proposed as a method to distinguish between some main movement classes. For example, the 'power law in disguise' paradox-from a composite Brownian motion consisting of a superposition of independent movement processes at different scales-may be resolved by shifting the focus from pattern analysis at one particular temporal resolution towards a more process-oriented approach involving several scales of observation. A more explicit consideration of system complexity within a statistical mechanical framework, supplementing the more traditional mechanistic modelling approach, is advocated.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, Centre for Ecological and Evolutionary Synthesis, University of Oslo, , PO Box 1066, Blindern, 0316 Oslo, Norway. a.o.gautestad@bio.uio.no
authors.forename: Arild O
authors.initials: AO
authors.lastname: Gautestad
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D008124:Locomotion; D008954:Models, Biological; D013223:Statistics as Topic / Q000379:methods