I am using the Discrete module in BayesTraits. I have a set of 1-9 serially homologous traits. For each pair of traits, I am comparing the 4-parameter model of independent evolution and the 8-parameter model of dependent evolution. Thus, each analysis has two inputs: A phylogeny, or evolutionary tree, and a matrix of presence/absence data (1/0) for a pair of traits for each species in the tree.
I want to test the hypothesis that the order of the traits is important. How can I get a p-value that tells me whether adjacency among traits significantly impacts the correlation between them? For example, a p-value below 0.05 would indicate that the correlation between a trait and the traits to either side of it (e.g., 4 compared to 3 and 4 compared to 5) are higher than correlations between non-adjacent traits.