From concrete to canopy: Illuminating moth biodiversity in New York City’s urban jungle
Fig 5
Pathways linking urban land cover to Lepidoptera diversity revealed by structural equation modeling.
Relationships among predictor variables and Simpson’s diversity generated by the structural equation model using reflective syntax. The top row of land cover classifications makes up the observed variable group, while the middle row represents the 3 latent variables. The thin single-headed arrows (pointing from latent to observed) denote the loadings of each land cover. Dashed lines represent the marker variables used to scale the latent construct. The double-headed arrows represent covariance between variables while the bolded lower arrows demonstrate the structural regression paths. Significance levels are denoted by asterisks: p < 0.05 (*), p < 0.01 (**), p < 0.001 (***). Nodes represent variables included in the model, while edges indicate associations between them. Thicker lines represent stronger relationships, with positive effects shown in green and negative effects in red. Edge weights are proportional to the strength of standardized regression coefficients.