PCLM-D-23-00274

But can it drive to Lapland? Comparison of electric car owners and general population for identification of psychosocial barriers to electric car adoption in Finland

PLOS Climate

Dear Dr. Sandman,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS Climate. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS Climate’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Apr 05 2024 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at climate@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pclm/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

• A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
• A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
• An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

João Pedro Costa Luz Baptista Gouveia, PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS Climate

Journal Requirements:

Additional Editor Comments (if provided):

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Does this manuscript meet PLOS Climate’s publication criteria? Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe methodologically and ethically rigorous research with conclusions that are appropriately drawn based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available (please refer to the Data Availability Statement at the start of the manuscript PDF file)?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception. The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

**********

4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS Climate does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

5. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: Reviewer #: This paper studies the psychosocial barriers factors affecting the of EV adoption in Finland based on survey data. The topic is important and interesting. However, there are some issues need to be handled before it can be considered to publish. Here are the comments:

1. Model and hypotheses

More emphasis is placed on statistically comparing questionnaire data to derive conclusions. However, the rationale behind the adoption of the logistic regression model is not specified. The expected hypotheses, variable selection, and related considerations are also not addressed. It is crucial to provide justification for choosing the logistic regression model, explain the anticipated hypotheses, elaborate on the process of variable selection, and discuss the relevance of each variable.

2. The mean age of the respondents are 45.7 ~ 54.7 years old in Table 2. Is there a bias in the data collection?

3. The paper implies that promoting a shift from ICEVs to EVs should be supported by policymakers. However, it does not explicitly discuss the policy implications of the findings. Consider adding a brief discussion on how the study's results can inform policy interventions to promote EV adoption and reduce emissions in Finland.

Reviewer #2: General comment

This study presents many results about EV users and their differences from other populations. The research question is not very clear though, as discussed below. The article has good potential, but more work is needed, mainly on the discussions, conclusions, and implications.

Title, abstract, Keywords

The title starts with a question that caught the attention of the reader. Later, it is mentioned “barriers to electric car adoption”. Reading the article, it is noticed much more analysis about the differences between the groups (EV users, non-EV users, and non-vehicle users) than a proper study about the barriers. Another point to consider is the use of the terminology “electric car” in the title. It is correct, but most of the article uses “EV”, an acronym for “Electric Vehicle” and the most used term in the current literature.

Introduction

The introduction covers well the content of the article although splitting it into 2 sections, a proper introduction and a literature review is suggested.

Materials and methods

The survey had a sufficient number of responses, and the statistical methods are appropriate with the analysis. On the other hand, the only quality filter cited was catching an impossible combination of answers (such as owning an EV but not owning a car), but no verification questions or minimum amount of time to complete the questionnaire was mentioned. Participants who receive money to complete surveys tend to answer them as quickly as possible at the expense of properly considering the questions.

Results and Discussion

The paper provided many results but there is a lack in the depth of the discussions related to them. An example is in section 3.2 (Comparison of EV owners and ICEV owners: Car use), where most of the text describes the results already presented in Table 4 instead of comparing the literature or formulating explanations for the results. This pattern is presented in the whole section and affects the whole article.

Conclusions

The conclusions provided some interesting implications for the findings, such as prioritizing lowering costs for new EV adopters instead of supporting existing EV drivers. However, more conclusions and implications can be provided with the obtained results.

Minor comment:

Table 1 has “Electric Vehicle” with the second word capitalized but the other words do not. It is not recommended the use of words such as “We” (line 111) or “our” (line 287). Line 355 is missing the subtitle 3.5.

**********

6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

**********

[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

Attachments

Attachment

Submitted filename: comments.docx

PCLM-D-23-00274R1

But can it drive to Lapland? Comparison of electric vehicle owners and general population for identification of attitudes, concerns and barriers related to electric vehicle adoption in Finland

PLOS Climate

Dear Dr. Sandman,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS Climate. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS Climate’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Jul 14 2024 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at climate@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pclm/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

• A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
• A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
• An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

João Pedro Costa Luz Baptista Gouveia, PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS Climate

Journal Requirements:

Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice.

Additional Editor Comments (if provided):

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #2: (No Response)

**********

2. Does this manuscript meet PLOS Climate’s publication criteria? Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe methodologically and ethically rigorous research with conclusions that are appropriately drawn based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available (please refer to the Data Availability Statement at the start of the manuscript PDF file)?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception. The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS Climate does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

**********

6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: This revised version has made great improvement according to reviewer's suggestions, it is very clear and the topic is interesting, so I think it should be published.

Reviewer #2: General Comments

In this version, the research goals are described more clearly. The decision to use "electric vehicle" instead of "electric car" is appropriate since it aligns with most of the literature. Additionally, the "Conclusions" section provides more insights for the readers. However, the paper still lacks a proper literature review section, and some sections describe the data rather than analyzing it (for example, see Section 3.2). The work has potential, mainly due to interesting results, but the adjustments made are still insufficient for publication. More work is necessary, specifically in refining the language, including a literature review section, and interpreting the results instead of just presenting them.

Specific Comments

Comment 1: As mentioned, a separate section of literature review is suggested. Although some content is covered in section 1, it is insufficient to the scope of the work.

Comment 2: The rationale behind the results is required. As also stated by other Reviewers, expected hypotheses and variable selection are not addressed, which compromises the analysis of the results.

Minors:

Line 401 has “Rsponses” instead of “Responses”.

In the previous review, it was suggested to avoid the use of “We” and “our”. It is possible to notice that the authors tried to follow the suggestion removing these words from the text. On the other hand, the authors repeated the use in new parts of the text, such as in line 158, 303, 431 and others.

Replace “prize” for “price” in lines 481 and 484.

The text in lines 221-224 has words missing and it is not clear.

Change “cente” for “centre” (line 357).

**********

7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

**********

[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

PCLM-D-23-00274R2

But can it drive to Lapland? Comparison of electric vehicle owners and general population for identification of attitudes, concerns and barriers related to electric vehicle adoption in Finland

PLOS Climate

Dear Dr. Sandman,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS Climate. After careful consideration, we consider that the article has improved but based on the reviewers comments, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the aditional points raised during the review process.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Aug 30 2024 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at climate@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pclm/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

• A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
• A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
• An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

João Pedro Costa Luz Baptista Gouveia, PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS Climate

Journal Requirements:

1. Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice.

Additional Editor Comments (if provided):

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #2: (No Response)

**********

2. Does this manuscript meet PLOS Climate’s publication criteria? Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe methodologically and ethically rigorous research with conclusions that are appropriately drawn based on the data presented.

Reviewer #2: Partly

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available (please refer to the Data Availability Statement at the start of the manuscript PDF file)?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception. The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS Climate does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #2: No

**********

6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #2: Summary: It is still not ready for publication. More work is needed to refine the quality of the text.

General Comments

This is the third version of the article“But can it drive to Lapland? Comparison of electric vehicle owners and general population for identification of attitudes, concerns and barriers related to electric vehicle adoption in Finland”. In the first version, it was suggested that the authors clarify the research questions, add a literature review, and expand the analysis of results and conclusions. In the second version, although the goals of the article were clearer and the conclusions provided more insights, the work still lacked a literature review section, and some sections described the data instead of analyzing it. In this third version, the data is better analyzed, and the literature review section has finally been added.

However, despite the time taken to implement these changes, the quality of the text is still insufficient for publication. Some parts are generic (lines 88-90; just as an example) while others are confusing (lines 356-360; just as an example), lacking references (lines 97-101; just as an example) or informal (lines 467-468; just as an example). It is important to restate that these lines are just specific examples of issues that occur throughout the entire work. The number of minor issues noted below further corroborates the necessity to improve the overall quality of the text. As this is the third version of the article, fewer mistakes were expected.

Minors:

Line 229 is suggested to use “EV” instead of “electric vehicle”.

Line 295 is suggested to used “EV” instead of “Ev”.

Line 233 is missing an “and” in “Shortened version Environmental Attitudes Inventory (EAI-12) (30) was used to investigate environmental attitudes of the participants (and) to investigate whether pro-environmental attitudes are”

Line 293 should remove “all”

Line 300-310 should be rewritten. In the current situation of the article, there are 3 contexts, when the data was collected (A), when the article was written (B) and when the revisions were implemented (C). B is not necessary if A and C are mentioned.

Line 356-360 is confusing.

Line 456 is suggested to remove “very”.

Line 470 is suggested to use “EV” instead of “electric vehicle”.

Line 475 is suggested to use “EV” instead of “electric vehicle”.

Line 509 is suggested to remove “together”.

Line 620 is suggested to rewrite the word “studys”.

**********

7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #2: No

**********

[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

But can it drive to Lapland?

A comparison of electric vehicle owners with the general population for identification of attitudes, concerns and barriers related to electric vehicle adoption in Finland

PCLM-D-23-00274R3

Dear Dr. Sandman,

We are pleased to inform you that your manuscript 'But can it drive to Lapland? A comparison of electric vehicle owners with the general population for identification of attitudes, concerns and barriers related to electric vehicle adoption in Finland' has been provisionally accepted for publication in PLOS Climate.

Before your manuscript can be formally accepted you will need to complete some formatting changes, which you will receive in a follow-up email from a member of our team. 

Please note that your manuscript will not be scheduled for publication until you have made the required changes, so a swift response is appreciated.

IMPORTANT: The editorial review process is now complete. PLOS will only permit corrections to spelling, formatting or significant scientific errors from this point onwards. Requests for major changes, or any which affect the scientific understanding of your work, will cause delays to the publication date of your manuscript.

If your institution or institutions have a press office, please notify them about your upcoming paper to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team as soon as possible -- no later than 48 hours after receiving the formal acceptance. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact climate@plos.org.

Thank you again for supporting Open Access publishing; we are looking forward to publishing your work in PLOS Climate.

Best regards,

João Pedro Costa Luz Baptista Gouveia, PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS Climate

***********************************************************

Reviewer Comments (if any, and for reference):

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed

**********

2. Does this manuscript meet PLOS Climate’s publication criteria? Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe methodologically and ethically rigorous research with conclusions that are appropriately drawn based on the data presented.

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available (please refer to the Data Availability Statement at the start of the manuscript PDF file)?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception. The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS Climate does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #2: (No Response)

**********

7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #2: No

**********