Aim: Although biodiversity is in sharp decline around the globe, collectiing precise information on changes in overall species richness remains extremely challenging. Efficient and reliable proxy methods are therefore needed, with the diversity of higher taxa representing one such potential proxy for species-level diversity. Nonetheless, the stability of using this measure across different regions and animal taxa at the global scale has never been investigated thoroughly. Location: Global. Time period: Up to 2016. Major taxa studied: Animalia. Methods: We used a large global dataset containing published studies on diversity in the terrestrial Animalia to analyse the relationship between diversity at the family, genus and species level across different orders. Results: Family and species diversity were positively correlated, with the strongest correlations in Diptera, Hemiptera and Coleoptera. Correlations were slightly weaker in family–species than in genus–species relationships, whereas differences were stronger in observed richness than in diversity indices. Across all taxa, family–species correlations of Shannon diversity index values were independent of sample size, and they showed limited variation across biomes for the three orders containing sufficient case studies for this analysis. Based on the Shannon diversity index, the species diversity per site increased linearly with the increase in family diversity, with an average species : family diversity index ratio of 2.5, slightly lower than the ratio of 2.7 for observed species and family richness values. Main conclusions: Our study confirmed that recording family-level diversity can be a meaningful proxy for determining species-level diversity patterns in biodiversity studies, and trade-offs between identification costs and retained information content need to be considered when using higher taxon surrogacy.

中文翻译：

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通过全球陆生动物分类群的家庭多样性对物种多样性的可预测性

目标：尽管全球生物多样性急剧下降，但收集有关整体物种丰富度变化的精确信息仍然极具挑战性。因此，需要有效和可靠的替代方法，更高分类群的多样性代表了物种水平多样性的一种潜在替代方法。尽管如此，从未彻底调查过在全球范围内在不同地区和动物分类群中使用这种措施的稳定性。地点：全球。时间段：截至 2016 年。研究的主要分类群：动物界。方法：我们使用包含已发表的陆生动物多样性研究的大型全球数据集来分析不同目中科、属和种水平的多样性之间的关系。结果：科和物种多样性呈正相关，在双翅目、半翅目和鞘翅目中的相关性最强。科-种的相关性略弱于属-种关系，而观察到的丰富度差异比多样性指数更强。在所有分类群中，香农多样性指数值的科 - 物种相关性与样本大小无关，并且对于包含用于该分析的足够案例研究的三个订单，它们在生物群落之间的变化有限。基于香农多样性指数，每个站点的物种多样性随着科多样性的增加而线性增加，平均物种：科多样性指数比为2.5，略低于实测物种和科丰富度值的2.7。主要结论：