Greetings, I've read several writing of yours about GLMM and I thought it would be the best tool to answer my research questions. However, I wasn't sure if I really need it and my data permit me to use it. That said, I have 78 individuals of firefly divided into four groups (A= 20 indv., B = 20 indv., C = 20 indv. and D = 18 indv.). This is due to several limitations that I can't take more samples of firefly. I will explain the details of the experiment below. I'm hoping that you can advise me on this issue, whether you have seen such cases of low sample size using GLMM or whether GLMM is not suitable for my study. I expose the fireflies with several intensity of white light according to their group (Group A = 0.05lux, B = 0.1lux, C = 0.3lux and D = 0.5lux) then measure their flash rates and duration before, during and after exposure to light (repeated measure design). Temperature, humidity and individual eye-to-body size ratio were also measured. My main aim was to measure the impact of several light pollution intensity to their flash rates and duration and taking temperature, humidity and eye-to-body size into account. I realized that calculating changes in their flash rates and duration are achievable by subtracting post-experiment result with pre-experiment result then use unpaired t-test to compare the results. However, my data was not normal and I used Mann-Whitney U test instead. But this does not take temperature, humidity and eye-to-body size into account. As I was looking into the possibility of taking them into account, I found several modelling technique that is suitable including GLMM but I am not sure if I can employ them because according to a statistician I am in consult with, the sample size is too small to be developed into a model that it would invite more problem in analysis.
Regards, Vickly Mobilim [[alternative HTML version deleted]]