Statistical Significance and Reproducibility of Tree-Ring Response Functions

Abstract

This paper is concerned with the overall significance and reproducibility of the response function. A test of significance is devised which is based on the Binomial distribution. Combined with other tests, the method is then used to compare two different response functions to examine the reproducibility of climate-chronology response. Two approaches are used: the first compares two response functions covering the same period from the same site, based on independent chronologies of the same species; the second compares the response of a single chronology over two equal non-overlapping time periods. The results suggest that the response in the examples used is statistically reproducible on a site, and statistically stable over periods of time.