Constraining PERMANOVA and LDM to within-set comparisons by projection improves the efficiency of analyses of matched sets of microbiome data

Table 1 Type I error for testing the community-level hypothesis at level 0.05

Scenario and analysis strategy	permanovaFL	adonis2	LDM
(1) Matched-pair data
Proposed	0.0491	0.0450	0.0479
Not adjusting for ID	0.0491	0.0441	0.0479
Unrestricted permutation	0.0024	0.0855	0.0169
(2) Unbalanced data
Proposed	0.0471	0.0434	0.0505
Not adjusting for ID	0.0501	0.0456	0.0500
Unrestricted permutation	0.0039	0.0732	0.0280
(3) Matched-pair data with a sample-level confounder X^sam
Proposed	0.0452	0.0429	0.0476
Not adjusting for X^sam	0.0688	0.0631	0.0800
Not adjusting for ID	0.0713	0.0328	0.0872
Unrestricted permutation	0.0016	0.0810	0.0163
(4) Matched-pair data with a set-level covariate X^set
Proposed	0.0510	0.0433	0.0481
Not adjusting for ID	0.0510	0.0451	0.0481
Not adjusting for ID, adjusting for X^set	0.0510	0.0450	0.0481
Unrestricted permutation	0.0021	0.0874	0.0162
(5) Unbalanced data with a set-level covariate X^set
Proposed	0.0479	0.0444	0.0480
Not adjusting for ID	0.0496	0.0446	0.0483
Not adjusting for ID, adjusting for X^set	0.0489	0.0445	0.0489
Unrestricted permutation	0.0048	0.0736	0.0257
(6) Matched-pair data with a continuous trait
Proposed	0.0505	0.044	0.0461
Not adjusting for ID	0.0677	0.0612	0.0881
Unrestricted permutation	0.190	0.906	0.994
(7) Matched-pair data with an interaction effect
Proposed	0.0524	0.0295	0.0536
Unrestricted permutation	0	0.0977	0

For each of the seven scenarios, results for three or four analysis strategies are presented. First in each scenario is the “Proposed” strategy that adjusts for the set ID indicators and sample-level covariates (if present), does not adjust for set-level covariates (if present), and performs restricted permutation within sets. Each alternative strategy is described by its difference from the proposed strategy; for example, “Unrestricted permutation” maintains all the elements of the proposed strategy except for replacing the recommended within-set permutation with an unrestricted permutation

ISSN: 2049-2618