The scientific study of relationships between organisms and their environments
_____ is the ultimate measure of success for all individual living organisms
The passing on of genes
An ecosystem is _____
The combination of biological communities and the physical environment in a given location
A biologist that studies the spatial processes that link adjacent communities is likely a _____
Landscape ecologist
Ecological models are used to _____
Provide predictions about ecological systems using a set of explicit assumptions
Which of the following disciplines is NOT generally integrated into ecological studies
Sociology
The scientific method has four major steps, which are executed in which order
Observation
Hypothesis generation
Prediction
Experimentation
Which of the following statements about hypothesis testing is true
Hypothesis testing can enable a scientist to eliminate incorrect ideas by disproving one or more hypotheses
In a simple linear regression model used to predict plant growth from the availability of nitrogen in the soil, which variable should be plotted on the y-axis
Plant growth
An ecologist in your school is developing models to explain the energy flow in a salt marsh on a local set of barrier islands. This type of research is _____