The article discusses a method developed by Gower and Krzanowski in 1999 for analyzing complex data that didn't meet the usual statistical assumptions. They used two main tools: a visual way to show points in fewer dimensions called principal coordinate analysis, and a technique like MANOVA but based on distances between subjects instead of sums of squares. This method doesn't rely on any specific data distribution. The researchers also talk about Stata commands pco and aod that conduct principal coordinate analysis and distance analysis.