The Effects of Dynamic and Static Forest Bathing (Shinrin-yoku) on Physiological and Psychological Health in Males and Females

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The article entitled ,,The Effects of Dynamic and Static Forest Bathing(Shinrin-yoku) on Physiological and Psychological Health of Males and Females” is interesting and current. The authors have been shown the role of exercise in achieving the health benefits of forest bathing and the role of sex on the effects of forest bathing by conducting dynamic and static forest bathing trials, investigating the effects of exposure to forest environments combined with intervention measures on males and females physical and mental health and their health care mechanisms, and providing theoretical support for the development of the forest tourism industry.

The cited references are current: 18 out of 36 within the last 5 years due to the actuality.

My remarks and recommendations are as follows:

 

1.     There are some formatting error in the text (especially with line spacing editing problem). Please standardize the marking of values (with two decimals, like 62.00 (e.g. “Average weight (kg) 62±11.78.

2.     The use of a non-parametric test is preferred for statistical verification of POMS, TMD scores and to give the p-value. Please correct them.

3.     The text of the table manuscript should be carefully checked and clarified (Table 1 and 2).

 

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

1. The topic of manuscript is to investigate effects of dynamic and static forest bathing between males and females. So, in the Introduction, the manuscript should argues strongly why this variables, such as dynamic and static forest bathing, males and females, are important for investigation.

2. Relating the above, literature review should expand on the variables, especially dynamic and static forest bathing, mentioned above.

3. The manuscript critically needs that how the participants were recruited. Why students, why 11participants for dynamic, and why 20 for static?

4. The study did not use control group participant for comparing with the effects of forest bathing. The study employed 'single group pre-post test design'. Why  not 'pre-post control group design'?

5. Those of the participants were homogeneous group?

 

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

As I asked: "The use of a non-parametric test is preferred for statistical verification of POMS, TMD scores and to give the p-value.Please correct them."

I accept that the variable TMD is normally distributed, if you represent this results with box-plot (not with normality test, because with low sample size is not worked). But for POMS (especially with low sample sizes) non-parametric analysis is preferable. 

The use of the paired sample t-tests for comparing physiological indicators is correct, but non-parametric tests are commonly used for comparing psychological test scores (questionnaire scores are discrete variables).

Please also find: Hiroko Ochiai et. al.: Physiological and Psychological Effects of Forest Therapy on Middle-Aged Males with High-Normal Blood Pressure, Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2015, 12, 2532-2542; doi:10.3390/ijerph120302532

Author Response

Response: Thank you for taking the time to process the submission of our paper entitled “The Effects of Dynamic and Static Forest Bathing(Shinrin-yoku) on Physiological and Psychological Health of Males and Females”.Thank you for your suggestions for correcting the analysis methods in the manuscript, which we fully endorse after discussion among the authors. We have changed the method of analyzing psychological measures in the manuscript to a Wilcoxon signed-rank test, and we have amended the results of the analysis.

Reviewer 2 Report

The manuscript has revised based on  the reviewer's comments.

Author Response

Response: Thank you for taking the time to process the submission of our paper entitled “The Effects of Dynamic and Static Forest Bathing(Shinrin-yoku) on Physiological and Psychological Health of Males and Females”. Thank you again for your suggestions and helping us refine the manuscript. best wishes.