Uncertainty in Determination of Meteorological Drought Zones Based on Standardized Precipitation Index in the Territory of Poland
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The review on the manuscript in Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health entitled „Uncertainty in determination of meteorological drought zones based on SPI in territory of Poland“.
The aim of the research is to analyze the accuracy and uncertainty of the spatial interpolation methods used for the reconstruction of the spatial distribution of the standardized precipitation index on the basis of publicly available precipitation data.
Broad comments
Correctness of data analysis is guaranteed if correct and controlled methods are used for data analysis. Each statistical method is based on a specific data distribution function. The compliance of the analyzed data with the required distribution function must always be checked using statistical tests. Unfortunately, the authors of this study have not done this, because it is written on lines 157-159 „In general, the precipitation P as many natural environmental variables is well described with the gamma distribution. It’s not very convenient for further analysis. On the other hand, the dummy variable U should be normally distributed [34,36]“.
Since there is no verification of the compliance of the data with the conditions underlying the methods, the conclusions of this study are not correct, that is, they are unreliable.
Academic writing should be objective. If it is subjective or emotional, it will lose persuasiveness and may be regarded as relying on emotion rather than building a reasonable argument based on evidence. The language or informal writing should therefore be impersonal, and should not include personal pronouns. For most subject areas the writing is expected to be objective. For this the first person (I, we, me, my, etc.) should be avoided. In this article on line 93 is written „we take into account“, on line 102 written „we may“, on line 128 is written „we focused“, on line 131 is written „We used“, etc. etc on lines 169, 255, 276, 290, 310,322, 340, 354, 362, 437 and 451. Eliminating personal pronouns from writing is highly recommend.
As a general rule, all non-standard abbreviations/acronyms should be written out in full on first use (in both the abstract and the paper itself) and followed by the abbreviated form in parentheses. Already in the title of the article, the abbreviation "SPI" is used, the meaning of which is not common, for example, in an internet search, it means "Serial Peripheral Interface". Etc. etc.
Specific comments
It must always be a space between the numerical value and unit symbol except the plane angle and percent – line 38 „1.1℃“, should be „1.1 ℃“, etc lines 122, 123, 126.
References to figures must be made in the same style in one article. Line 97 has "(Figure 1a)", but line 138 has "(Figure 2 a, b)", etc.
For figures consisting of several parts, the parts must be labeled in the same way, for example (a), (b), etc. At the same time, the caption of the figures must contain explanations for all marked parts. Figures 6 and 11 do not have such markings.
Equations must be formatted using the Equation editor, not pseudo-graphics.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
In this manuscript, the authors focused on the assessment of the accuracy of five interpolation methods for the spatial distribution of SPI-1 in Poland. Although the topic is of interest to scholars, this reviewer has identified pitfalls listed in the detailed report below. The weaknesses include, among other things, unclear research questions and aims, the method, and the conclusions. There are several places in the article where paragraphs are not well connected with each other. In my opinion, the manuscript is not ready for publication.
Detailed report
Authors are advised to address these pitfalls:
The English of the paper is full of occasional grammatical errors, and deserving professional language editing.
Abstract: I would like to suggest the authors reword the Abstract to provide the reader with a brief overview of the topic, findings, and implications.
L15-16 and L76-77: “The period 1990-2020 is taken into account, but all available data are 76 applied for the calculation of precipitation statistics, from 1950 until 2022.” Please consider rewording.
The sentences used in the Abstract are directly picked up from other parts of the text. It is not a professional and scientific way!
Introduction: I would like to ask the authors to address these issues: what is the research question(s) that the authors face in this work? Although the authors seem to introduce a sort of ‘research gap’ and ‘aim’.
No comprehensive literature review was done.
Clear what the authors mean by SPI-1. Why didn’t use other scales of SPI study? In my opinion, SPI 12 is more rational than SPI1.
Figure 1: PL = Poland is not displayed in the figure.
L101: According to this approach …
Which approach?
L139: Why the number of stations is decreased? Discuss.
L172-L253: three pages from M&M are not documented!
L244: “Twelve stations are chosen as control stations.” This number is quite low for the such a large country and among a lot of stations.
Results:
L255-L260: Delete. These explanations are not results!
Figure 2: “interpolation of SPI-2 with Natural Neighbor.” Edit.
My suggestion is to reword all titles. Remove the repeated words!
Many texts have repeated the M&M or title of figures. Authors should avoid numerous copies of the same information.
Figures 6 & 7: add the titles of the horizontal and vertical axis.
Improve the quality and visibility of all figures.
Figures 5 and 8: Legend and text are not readable.
Figure 9: Legend not complete. What are its title and unit?
Avoid saying “SPI index”. The "index" is abbreviated in the SPI.
No method is presented in the M&M about measuring the accuracy and uncertainty! What was the main objective of the research?
Results: how did the authors ensure that the interpolated results are right?
Discussion:
L385-L386: “It is very important to monitor, analyze and assess the impact of droughts on a global, regional and local scale.” Did you analyze the impacts?
A more detailed discussion of the results is necessary.
Conclusion:
L462-L463: “The presented results prove that all the tested methods are uncertain, but some of 462 of them provide better results.” Why?
What is the answer to the research question(s)?
Furthermore, what are the main pros and cons of SPI-1 and Interpolation methods considered in the study? Why is this study important for international scholars? What is the novelty of the study compared to what is already known? What are the lessons learned, which can be exported to other international contexts? What are the limitations of the study and method? What are the future lines of research suggested to overcome the current limitations of the study?
Data Availability Statement: “Data sharing is not applicable to this article.” When it is publicly available for all, why you cannot share them with other researchers?
References: The authors should be selective in citing studies and should choose to cite only those studies that are most relevant and impactful. Without it, the article can't stand out in the crowds of literature.
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
The review on the manuscript in Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health entitled „Uncertainty in determination of meteorological drought zones based on Standardized Precipitation Index in territory of Poland“.
The aim of the research is to analyze the accuracy and uncertainty of the spatial interpolation methods used for the reconstruction of the spatial distribution of the standardized precipitation index on the basis of publicly available precipitation data.
Broad comments
The article has been significantly supplemented and corrected.
Research methods have been described at satisfactory level. The conclusions are based on analysis and are adequate.
The article needs a minor technical corrections.
Specific comments
Splitting words should be avoided in the title of the article.
All paragraphs in an article must be formatted the same way. Paragraphs starting at lines 114, 151, 158, 161, 174, 197, 266, 284, 290 and 420 have no indentation.
Equation (3) must have a period at the end, not a comma, because no explanation follows the equation.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
Thank you very much for your evaluation of our manuscript. We appreciate your time and kind suggestions. All three remarks were applied. The parts of the text which were modified are marked in a copy of the resubmitted manuscript.
Sincerely,
the Authors
Responses to specific comments
(1) Splitting words should be avoided in the title of the article.
The splitting of the words was a result of automatic word processing in MS Word. This problem was fixed but requires specific care in the final stage of the manuscript editing before publication. The authors promise they take care of this problem.
(2) All paragraphs in an article must be formatted the same way. Paragraphs starting at lines 114, 151, 158, 161, 174, 197, 266, 284, 290 and 420 have no indentation.
The formatting of the indicated paragraphs is corrected now.
(3) Equation (3) must have a period at the end, not a comma, because no explanation follows the equation.
The suggested correction was applied.
Reviewer 2 Report
I am not satisfied with the authors' revisions. It needs to retake attention to my previous comments.
Best
Author Response
Dear Reviewer,
Thank you very much for your time and kind evaluation of our submission. We have taken a lot of care to answer your remarks with as many details as it was possible. We did it the best as we can, our answer to your previous comments is greater than four pages in A4 format. If there is still missing information, please specify where we should comment it more detail. Additionally, according to your suggestion, the paper was also checked by a professional English editor. We hope that you appreciate our effort. Thank you in advance.
Sincerely,
the Authors
