How Urban Residents Perceive Nature Education: A Survey from Eight Metropolises in China

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Dear Authors,

The article deals with a very important topic today. There are some issues that need to be improved. These are:

• Describe better the main purpose of the article in the introduction section.
• In line 110, remove a t from the word through.
• Add a dot after each number in the section titles (e.g. 2.2. etc.).
• Check the spacing between words (e.g. line 138).
• What does NE mean? Probably natural education ... In line 153 write the full name and then put the acronym NE in parentheses. After that you can write only the acronym in the article.
• It would be easier to visualize the cities where the questionnaires were collected, if you had a map with the geographical location of the eight metropolises.
• It would be helpful if you could explain on what basis you chose the eight metropolises.
• In table 1 delimit the basic information (e.g. gender, marriage etc.). In this format it is difficult to separate the information. Also convert yuan to dollars or euros so that the information can be perceived by the reader. Add the letter h to the monthly word in Table 1.
• What does ANOVA mean? Write the full name, then put the acronym in parentheses.
• In line 225, remove the word see in parentheses (Table 2).
• Briefly describe the statistical methods used in the analysis of the questionnaires.
• A description of the items used in the questionnaires is needed. If the items have multiple answers? If the items are open answers? Did you use Likert scale items? What is the total number of items used in the questionnaire? and so on ...
• Insert a legend at the end of Table 2 to explain what the acronyms M, SD MIN etc. in line 1 mean.
• The note from line 232, to be integrated in the paragraph without appearing as a note.
• I saw that you describe the items in section 3.3. There is a need for a better organization of the description of the questionnaire and the items used. It is difficult for the reader to follow the information in section 3.3.
• You have no reference to table 3 in the text. Fix this! 
• Verify that the values in the text match those in the tables (e.g. the first paragraph  of the section 4.1. or section 4.4.). 
• You have no reference to table 4 in the text. Fix this!
• Format table 4 like the other tables. The information is difficult to read in this form of editing.
• You have no reference to table 5 in the text. Fix this!
• Separate the discussion section from the conclusions ... if you want to merge the discussion section with section 4. The conclusions section should be independent.
• You are missing reference 10 from the bibliography. Also check that all the titles in the bibliography are found as citations in the article.

I wish you all the best!

Sincerely,

Author Response

Dear Reviewers，

On behalf of all the contributing authors, we thank you very much for giving us an opportunity to revise our manuscript. Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our research. We have tried our best to revise our manuscript according to the comments. We appreciate for editors and reviewers warm work earnestly and hope that the correction will meet with approval. Point-by-point responses are listed below.

• Describe better the main purpose of the article in the introduction section.

Great thanks for your comment. We already improved introduction section and tried to explain main purpose of the study.

• In line 110, remove a t from the word through.

Great thanks for your comment. We already correct the word.

• Add a dot after each number in the section titles (e.g. 2.2. etc.).

Great thanks for your comment. We already add a dot.

• Check the spacing between words (e.g. line 138).

Great thanks for your comment. We already checked the spacing.

• What does NE mean? Probably natural education ... In line 153 write the full name and then put the acronym NE in parentheses. After that you can write only the acronym in the article.

Great thanks for your comment. NE means “Nature Education”. We already use full name and put acronym after that.

• It would be easier to visualize the cities where the questionnaires were collected, if you had a map with the geographical location of the eight metropolises.

Great thanks for your comment. We already add a simple map to show the geographical location of the cities.

• It would be helpful if you could explain on what basis you chose the eight metropolises.

Great thanks for your comment. In this study, 4 national central cities (Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen) and 4 regional central cities (Chengdu, Xiamen, Hangzhou and Wuhan), as most representative cities with the densest population and the earlier start of nature education in China, were selected to be sample cities.

• In table 1 delimit the basic information (e.g. gender, marriage etc.). In this format it is difficult to separate the information. Also convert yuan to dollars or euros so that the information can be perceived by the reader. Add the letter h to the monthly word in Table 1.

Great thanks for your comment. (1) We already remade the table so that data could be showed more clearly. (2) We have marked the exchange rate between RMB and Euro for readers to understand. (3) We already correct the word.

• What does ANOVA mean? Write the full name, then put the acronym in parentheses.

Great thanks for your comment. ANOVA is acronym of Analysis of Variance. We already put full name there.

• In line 225, remove the word see in parentheses (Table 2).

Great thanks for your comment. We already remove the word.

• Briefly describe the statistical methods used in the analysis of the questionnaires.

Great thanks for your comment. We have added a brief description in the text. Actually, to attain the goal of exploring the views and attitudes of Chinese urban habitants towards nature and NE, SPSS 26 was used to explore the status quo of the respondents’ understanding of nature and NE and their potential to engage in relevant activities in the future. A t-test (also called Student’s T Test) which compares two averages (means) and tells you if they are different from each other was adopted to further measure the variances in views of respondents with different genders and marital status. Besides, analysis of variance (ANOVA) was utilized to examine the differences in attitudes among participants with different ages, education levels and family incomes. ANOVA is a collection of statistical models, and their associated procedures, in which the observed variance in a particular variable is partitioned into components attributable to different sources of variation. In its simplest form ANOVA provides a statistical test of whether or not the means of several groups are all equal, and therefore generalizes t-test to more than two groups. Doing multiple two-sample t-tests would result in an increased chance of committing a type I error. For this reason, ANOVAs are useful in comparing two, three or more means. So it was used to test the attitude of different group. Factor analysis is also used to measure the scale of cognition and attitude towards nature and natural education to improve its validity. Finally, their motivation and preference for nature education were analyzed to display a fuller picture of Chinese urban dwellers’ perspectives on nature and nature education.

• A description of the items used in the questionnaires is needed. If the items have multiple answers? If the items are open answers? Did you use Likert scale items? What is the total number of items used in the questionnaire? and so on ...

Great thanks for your comment. Information about the items and scoring methods of the questionnaire has been described in detail in the section of variables. We also have added a brief description in section 3.2.1. The questionnaire consists of five parts: basic information, perceptions of nature education, participation in nature education activities, motivations for participation and the tendency to participate in the future. Questionnaire for the survey, with a total of 28 items, was approximately 10 minutes in length. Data were collected between March 31 and April 13, 2021. Part of basic information, consists of 8 items, while 7 items in part of perceptions of nature education, 5 items in part of participation in nature education activities, 2 items in part of motivations for participation and 6 items in part of the tendency to participate in the future.

• Insert a legend at the end of Table 2 to explain what the acronyms M, SD MIN etc. in line 1 mean.

Great thanks for your comment. We have already added a legend at the end of the table to explain acronyms.

• The note from line 232, to be integrated in the paragraph without appearing as a note.

Great thanks for your comment. We have already integrated the note into the paragraph.

• I saw that you describe the items in section 3.3. There is a need for a better organization of the description of the questionnaire and the items used. It is difficult for the reader to follow the information in section 3.3.

Great thanks for your comment. We have re-organized the description in this section.

• You have no reference to table 3 in the text. Fix this! 

Great thanks for your comment. We have fixed it.

• Verify that the values in the text match those in the tables (e.g. the first paragraph  of the section 4.1. or section 4.4.). 

Great thanks for your comment. We have fixed it.

• You have no reference to table 4 in the text. Fix this!

Great thanks for your comment. We have fixed it.

• Format table 4 like the other tables. The information is difficult to read in this form of editing.

Great thanks for your comment. We have remade the table.

• You have no reference to table 5 in the text. Fix this!

Great thanks for your comment. We have fixed it.

• Separate the discussion section from the conclusions ... if you want to merge the discussion section with section 4. The conclusions section should be independent.

Great thanks for your comment. We have separated the discussion section from the conclusions.

• You are missing reference 10 from the bibliography. Also check that all the titles in the bibliography are found as citations in the article.

Great thanks for your comment. We have checked and re-edited all references.

I wish you all the best!

Sincerely,

Reviewer 2 Report

 How Urban Residents Perceive Nature Education: A Survey from 8 Metropolises in China

 This paper examines the perceptions of Chinese residents about the fairly new concept of Nature education. It is well-written, and the literature review provided a clear presentation of the field so far.

The study is a cross-sectional research. The sample was derived from a convenience sampling procedure (it was not selected randomly as stated at line 198). There is no need to include details about the 2019 study. The research questions/ hypotheses aren’t stated.

The results are merely descriptive in nature and the only inferential statistical analyses implemented (independent samples t-test, one-way ANOVA) were presented all together in Table 2. Everything else is just the percentage of each category. A factor analysis is briefly mentioned, but it’s not elaborated. If this was an improved instrument, its psychometric properties should be included in the paper (even if it needs to be citation to previous works).

In my opinion, the result section of this paper requires in fact to be written all over, including new analyses and better presentation of the findings. I don’t think that this manuscript is suitable for Sustainability.

Author Response

Dear Reviewers，

On behalf of all the contributing authors, we thank you very much for giving us an opportunity to revise our manuscript. Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our research. We have tried our best to revise our manuscript according to the comments. We appreciate for editors and reviewers warm work earnestly and hope that the correction will meet with approval. Point-by-point responses are listed below.

• The study is a cross-sectional research. The sample was derived from a convenience sampling procedure (it was not selected randomly as stated at line 198). There is no need to include details about the 2019 study. The research questions/ hypotheses aren’t stated.

Great thanks for your comment. As you pointed out, this study is a cross-sectional research. We think it should aim to describe the present situation. Specifically, this study highlights the results of the online survey among the Chinese public to gather insights on awareness, attitudes and behaviours towards nature and nature education. And we think that this study is a descriptive study that may not need to make assumptions.

• The results are merely descriptive in nature and the only inferential statistical analyses implemented (independent samples t-test, one-way ANOVA) were presented all together in Table 2. Everything else is just the percentage of each category. A factor analysis is briefly mentioned, but it’s not elaborated. If this was an improved instrument, its psychometric properties should be included in the paper (even if it needs to be citation to previous works).

Great thanks for your comment. We take this research as a descriptive research, so all variables in the survey are only statistically described. On the other hand, the instrument used in this research is a quantitative tool developed by China Nature Education Network, and its specific objectives include the following five aspects:

- Measure public participation in nature education

- Understand perceptions of and motivation for participating in nature education

- Understand satisfaction with nature education programs

- Identify opportunities to grow public awareness and participation in nature education activities

• In my opinion, the result section of this paper requires in fact to be written all over, including new analyses and better presentation of the findings.

Great thanks for your comment.We have tried out best to re-wrote some parts.

Yours sincerely,

Reviewer 3 Report

Dear Author, thank you for your relevant contribution in contemporary topic. While the topic is important, the paper requires a number of revisions before it can be considered.

1. Abstract - purpose of this research is not clear and also the abstract didn’t cover the implication.

2. Introduction need serious improvement. The problem statement is not sharpened enough and it didn’t have clear focus. Problem is neither logically driven nor supported by the data and statistics. The introductory statement fails to explore the scope of this paper by reviewing latest literature. Author may look:

• Alam, G. M. and Parvin. M (2022). Three Parameters of Urban K-8 Education During Pre- and Post- Covid-19 Restrictions: Comparison of Students of Slums, Tin-Sheds, and Flats in Bangladesh, Education and Urban Society. https://doi.org/10.1177/00131245221086277. I attach the paper to read if that helps.             

3. Research aim, objectives and questions are need to integrated. This is missing.

4. Concept of Urban education and Urban and socioeconomic issues need to explained more. I suggest the author should look some more relevant paper from Education and Urban Society journal to develop their concept. In addition to this, the author should relook following papers:

• Do Urbanized Socioeconomic Background or Education Programs Support Engineers for Further Advancement? International Journal of Educational Reforms       
• What makes a difference for Further Advancement of Engineers: Socioeconomic Background or Education Programs? Higher Education

 5. Author should separate discussions from conclusion. Neither the conclusion nor the discussions are rich enough. Implication of this study is fully missing.

6. Findings should be elaborated more and they must be analysed properly.

The paper needs a serious editing.

Good luck        

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Dear Reviewers，

On behalf of all the contributing authors, we thank you very much for giving us an opportunity to revise our manuscript. Those comments are all valuable and very helpful for revising and improving our paper, as well as the important guiding significance to our research. We have tried our best to revise our manuscript according to the comments. We appreciate for editors and reviewers warm work earnestly and hope that the correction will meet with approval. Point-by-point responses are listed below.

1. Abstract - purpose of this research is not clear and also the abstract didn’t cover the implication.

Great thanks for your comment. We have re-wrote concerned parts.

2. Introduction need serious improvement. The problem statement is not sharpened enough and it didn’t have clear focus. Problem is neither logically driven nor supported by the data and statistics. The introductory statement fails to explore the scope of this paper by reviewing latest literature. 

Greate thanks for your comment. We have tried to improve it. 

2. Research aim, objectives and questions are need to integrated. This is missing.

Great thanks for your comment. We have tried to added these parts.

4. Concept of Urban education and Urban and socioeconomic issues need to explained more. I suggest the author should look some more relevant paper from Education and Urban Society journal to develop their concept. 

Great thanks for your comment. We have tried to integrate your advices into new version.

5. Author should separate discussions from conclusion. Neither the conclusion nor the discussions are rich enough. Implication of this study is fully missing.

Greate thanks for your comment. We have re-wrote discussion and conclusion parts. And we have tried to add implications.

6. Findings should be elaborated more and they must be analysed properly.

Greate thanks for your comment. We have tried our best to follow your suggestions in the revised version.

yours sincerely,

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Dear Authors,

I really appreciate your effort to improve the article. There are still small issues to change. These are:

• Replace the word diagram with the figure both in the text and below the figure. In line 197 is sufficient if you put Figure 1 in parentheses (Figure 1).
• For figure 1:
  - use kilometers instead of miles for the representation scale;
  - write the names in English for the 8 cities;
  - write China's neighbors on the map.
• The dot at the end of the sentence is doubled in line 251.
• Check the word spacing in line 259.
• Use the same editing settings in all tables. Table 3 has different Fonts. Fix this issue. Also refer to table 3 in the text before inserting the table.

Wish you all the best & Sincerely!

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,   Thank you so much for giving us another opportunity to revise our manuscript entitled “How Urban Residents Perceive Nature Education: A Survey from 8 Metropolises in China (manuscript no. sustainability-1680655). We highly appreciate the reviewers’ and editors’ constructive comments and suggestions on our manuscript, which is really helpful for us. As attached, please also find the detailed reply to the reviewers’ comments.  

• Replace the word diagram with the figure both in the text and below the figure. In line 197 is sufficient if you put Figure 1 in parentheses (Figure 1).

Thanks for pointing it out. We apologize for the mistake. We already revised it according to your comment. And because we changed the presentation of city information according to the comment from other reviewer, the content of Figure 1 also changed. This is also related to our following response.

• For figure 1:
  - use kilometers instead of miles for the representation scale;
  - write the names in English for the 8 cities;
  - write China's neighbors on the map.

Thanks a lot for your comments. Considering the possible risks of using maps without official authorization in the article, and the comment from another reviewer that is negative with using map, we use table 1 to present the basic information of the sample cities instead of map. Hope you will understand our situation.

• The dot at the end of the sentence is doubled in line 251.

Thanks for pointing it out. We apologize for the mistake. We already revised it according to your comment.

• Check the word spacing in line 259.

Thanks for pointing it out. We apologize for the mistake. We already revised it according to your suggestion.

• Use the same editing settings in all tables. Table 3 has different Fonts. Fix this issue. Also refer to table 3 in the text before inserting the table.

Thanks for pointing it out. We apologize for the mistake. We already revised it according to your suggestion.

We appreciate for your warm work earnestly and hope that the correction will meet with approval.

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear authors,

Thank you for taking the time to revise the paper according to some of my suggestions. Unfortunately, the main concerns I had during the first review have not been addressed. Specifically:

1. There are no research questions stated.
2. The analyses are the same, just some percentages, and independent samples t-test and ANOVAs.
3. lines 236-248. Although, I really appreciate the authors' effort, this section should be omitted, because it provides just an overview of some assumptions of the mentioned analyses.
4. line 248: There is no factor analysis provided in the paper.
5. I don't think that Diagram 1 is necessary.

Author Response

Dear Editors and Reviewers,

Thank you so much for giving us another opportunity to revise our manuscript entitled “How Urban Residents Perceive Nature Education: A Survey from 8 Metropolises in China (manuscript no. sustainability-1680655). We highly appreciate the reviewers’ and editors’ constructive comments and suggestions on our manuscript, which is really helpful for us. 

We have studied the comments very carefully and have accordingly made revisions marked in red in the revised version, which we would like to submit for your kind consideration. Point-by-point responses are listed below.  

1. There are no research questions stated.

Many thanks for your comment. We have added our research questions at the end of introduction part according to your comment.

2. The analyses are the same, just some percentages, and independent samples t-test and ANOVAs.

Thanks a lot for your constructive comment. We have studied the comments very carefully and added linear regression analysis into analysis part and try to supplement the deficiency of simple descriptive analysis. We already mark it in red in revised version.

3. lines 236-248. Although, I really appreciate the authors' effort, this section should be omitted, because it provides just an overview of some assumptions of the mentioned analyses.

Thanks a lot for your constructive comment. Sorry for confusion we made. We already deleted these unnecessary sentences.

4. line 248: There is no factor analysis provided in the paper.

Thanks for pointing it out. We apologize for the mistake. We already deleted this sentence according to your suggestion.

5. I don't think that Diagram 1 is necessary.

Thanks a lot for your constructive comment. We have studied your comment very carefully. To avoid possible risks of using maps without official authorization in the article, we have used a table to replace the map. Please kindly see table 1 in revised version.

We appreciate for your warm work earnestly and hope that the correction will meet with approval.

Reviewer 3 Report

Can be published 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

Thanks a lot for your positive comment on our manuscript entitled “How Urban Residents Perceive Nature Education: A Survey from 8 Metropolises in China (manuscript no. sustainability-1680655). We highly appreciate the reviewers’ constructive comments and suggestions on our manuscript, which is really helpful for us. We have studied the comments very carefully and have accordingly made revisions marked in red in the revised version, which we would like to submit for your kind consideration. Please see the revised version. 

We hope that the revision and correction will meet with approval.

Round 3

Reviewer 2 Report

I can see that the authors have made huge progress on their paper, and I am really pleased about it.

The result section is not clearly presented, though. Did you perform linear regression with nominal independent variables? Are you presenting the F or the parameter estimates for each model? What are the alternative models? What is the model that you prefer? Lots of information

The paper has improved greatly, and I think that, if the presentation of the findings improves as well, then it might be suitable for publication.

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

Thank you so much for giving us another opportunity to revise our manuscript entitled “How Urban Residents Perceive Nature Education: A Survey from 8 Metropolises in China (manuscript no. sustainability-1680655). We highly appreciate your constructive comments and suggestions on our manuscript, which is really helpful for us. We have studied the comments very carefully and have accordingly made revisions marked in red and yellow in the revised version, which we would like to submit for your kind consideration. As attached, please also find the detailed reply to your comments. We hope that the revision and correction will meet with approval.

1. Did you perform linear regression with nominal independent variables?

Thank you for pointing it out. We apologize for the mistake we made. In this study, dependent variables are continuous variables, independent variables are ordinal variables, and control variables are nominal variables. In the previous version of the manuscript, we did do a linear regression on nominal variables, but this was incorrect. We have corrected and updated data in this release. Please see the new table7 and table 8.

2. Are you presenting the F or the parameter estimates for each model?

Many thanks for your comments and pointing it out. Data presented in table7 and table 8 are unstandardized coefficients and we missed F-test values for each model in last version. And we have supplemented the F-test results for each model in this release. Please see the lines marked in yellow in table 7 and table 8.

3. What are the alternative models?

Thanks a lot for your question. We have studies this carefully. In the light of our present knowledge, each of our models is actually appropriate and we have discussed all models. Alternative models are not discussed in this study. Certainly, we will further explore it in our future work. 

4. What is the model that you prefer?

Thanks a lot for your question. Model 1 is the explanation of the control variable for the dependent variable, and the data show that the model is significant, that is, the control variable will have an impact on the dependent variable. Model 2 is the effect of "factors related to nature" on the dependent variable. Model 3 is the effect of "factors related to nature education" on the dependent variable. Model 4 is the effect of "factors related to nature" and "factors related to nature education" on the dependent variable, and explore the influence of two types of factors.  Model 5 is an exploration of the influence of two important factors on the dependent variable after adding control variables. If we choose, we prefer Model 5 which is more comprehensive. Model 5 reduces the error caused by the omission of other variables. The effect of the main independent variable of our concern on the dependent variable is more accurately explained. On the other hand, the R-square is actually increasing from model 1 to model 5. This also shows that the explanatory ability of the model 5 is relatively strong.

Round 4

Reviewer 2 Report

The revised paper has been substantially improved. The authors have addressed most (not all) of the points raised. The main concerns have been covered, so I am positive for the publication of the paper.