Exploring the Relationship between Key Perceptual Elements of Urban Secondary Wilderness and Its Restorative Benefits

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper addresses the issue of USWs, natural land areas within urban areas, which have the function of reconnecting humans with the world of nature. Such parts of the territory are dominated by natural processes instead of humans. The study develops an evaluation system containing 2 types of dimensions and 17 perceptual elements. The results show that the natural elements present have good restorative benefits for users. The issue is current and very important for the future, from a sustainable perspective, of our cities .  The study arrives at the results through a rigorous methodology and an appropriate survey done on a very representative sample whose questionnaire validity rate reaches 93.7 percent. The evaluation of the perception of the identified perceptual elements is proposed by measuring the restorative benefits. The software used SPSS although dated is effective for this type of survey. The chapter “Inadequate Research” on the limitations of the research is very pertinent.

While I understand the experimental nature of the work the references are poorly referenced in the text and I would also recommend more up-to-date references.

 

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript.

Please see the attached file.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

I have reviewed the manuscript and found that the subject is interesting and the aim of the contribution is clear. The paper has merits for the scientific community interested in possible models for evaluating the perceptual elements of urban secondary wilderness, identifying key elements, and recognizing related experiential benefits such as environmental restorative benefits. The authors searched for a correlation between perceptual elements and benefits.

 

Below are my comments and suggestions:

 

1.      Consider changing the title to: ‘Exploring the Relationship Between Key Perceptual Elements of Urban Secondary Wilderness and Their Restorative Benefits’. To me, it sounds better.

 2.      The abstract should be slightly rewritten and the use of the acronym USWs reduced. The study area (Fuzhou, the capital city of Fujian Province, China) should be mentioned. Details belonging to the results section are correctly given. Correct grammar (‘two’ instead of ‘2’ – do it everywhere in the manuscript; in the last sentence avoid numbering (1), (2), and (3) but leave the text)

 3.      The introduction is informative with good references. The last paragraph briefly presents the main findings which are helpful for the reader to follow the next sections. The study area (Fuzhou, the capital city of Fujian Province, China) should be mentioned in this part of the manuscript .

 4.      The Materials and Methods. Avoid Eq. 1; otherwise, a detailed description of it (variables) must be given. Better avoid it. Hopefully, readers are familiar with 2D correlation. In Fig. 2 rotate ‘Implicit importance’ on vertical axes for 180 degrees. Briefly describe what is ‘IPA-Kano analysis’ and ‘Origin software’ (references?). Improve style, e.g. ‘Sixt...’ should be the new paragraph. Give reference to ‘Kano's theory’. Avoid (1) after USWs. In the subsection 2.2 (l. 136-144) lists indicators following grammar rules, e.g. it is wrong to write ‘included 12 indicators, A1. Plants, A2. animals, ...’.

5.      In the Results and Discussion sections, there is too much experimental data that could be reduced and thus come up to a more coherent manuscript, easier to read and understand findings. Consider significantly condensing this part of the manuscript and reducing the number of tables, or moving them into the appendix. In subsection 4.2. presented correlation coefficients are quite low. Explain why this result suggests that (seven) key perceptual elements positively drive the restorative benefits of USWs. Is it because the r values are positive?

6.      Extend the Conclusion section and provide a future research agenda.

7.      Generally, limitations and potential drawbacks of experiment design are not discussed. For instance, the last sentence in the conclusions starts with ‘This study optimizes the past perception evaluation system...’. What are the arguments that this study optimizes earlier evaluation systems?

8.      Typos and grammar errors must be corrected and I suggest professional proofreading of the manuscript.

 

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript.

Please see the attached file.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

- introduction: include more recent references to support your claims, particularly from the past five years.

- research design: provide more detail on the selection criteria for study sites and subjects to enhance the replicability of your study.

- methods: expand on the field research procedures and the validation processes for the questionnaire.

- results: offer a deeper explanation of the statistical analysis, including significance levels and implications of your findings.

- conclusions: Discuss the limitations of your study in more detail and propose directions for future research.

- english language: improve readability and clarity.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

The English language quality is generally good but requires minor editing to improve readability and clarity.

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript.

Please see the attached file.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The abstract starts with: "Urban secondary wilderness (USWs) is a near-natural place in the city and is an important 8 link to reconnect humans with the natural world. Evaluating the perceptual elements of USWs not only provides an understanding of public perceptions and preferences for USWs, but also helps to 10 further explore the correlation between the perceptual elements and experiential values such as en- 11 vironmental restorative benefits".

The analysis is interesting. However, it may give the message to the reader that 1) USWs and 2) analysis of perceptions are the ways on how to understand how to reconnect humans to the natural world. 

1) the possible future development of the human living environment within the natural world, intead of a re-creation of the natural world inside large cities is not taken into consideration. Could it be a possible path for the future, for a sustainable and prosperous living? The analysis could contain such hypothesis

2) the approach based on perceptions remains limited to the feelings of humans in the present situation, which do not take any other option into account, of a living environment within the natural world, because it is not presented to them as an option nor might come to mind to a person who has always lived in a city.

The possible future development of human environments within existing natural ecosystems shoudl at least be taken into consideration, as a possibility to return to nature, in contraposition with human development history. Considerations about more objective mechanisms of human-nature interaction, which exist in spite of human perceptions (the benefits of natural elements, such as plants and other substances for human life) could be included and compared with the described human perceptions.

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript.

Please see the attached file.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

My comments and recommendations are sufficiently well followed.

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors,

Overall, the revisions you have made are satisfactory and have substantially improved the quality of the manuscript. I recommend this revised version for publication.

Best regards,

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Moderate editing of the English language is required to address awkward phrasing and grammatical errors.

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript.

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The paper has improved as it was expressly mentioned that the study is about perceptions and that future studies could address other natural environments. However a minor suggestion could mention whether there are trends of backward movements of people from the city to the countryside and the option of considering future patterns of living, within nature.

Author Response

Thank you very much for taking the time to review this manuscript.

Please see the attached file.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf