Perceptions of tourists of the resources, ecological service functions and recreation value of the Guanwu National Forest Recreation Area

Shou-Tsung Wu; Yi-Ta Hsieh; Shang-Chuan Huang; Chun-Hung Wei; Chaur-Tzuhn Chen; Jan-Chang Chen

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0257835

Peer Review History

Original SubmissionApril 16, 2021
24 May 2021 Decision Letter - Shah Md Atiqul Haq, Editor PONE-D-21-12141 The study of evaluations of the resources of the Guanwu National Forest Recreation Area by tourists, their perceptions toward the ecosystem service functions provided and their recreational activities PLOS ONE Dear Dr.Chen, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’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 08 2021 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 plosone@plos.org. 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If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols. We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript. Kind regards, Shah Md Atiqul Haq Academic Editor PLOS ONE Additional Editor Comments (if provided): Dear authors, I would like to ask you to revise the paper taking into account the comments and suggestions of the reviewers. After I receive the revised version, I may send the paper again to new reviewers to get their opinion. Yours sincerely, Journal Requirements: When submitting your revision, we need you to address these additional requirements. 1) Please ensure that your manuscript meets PLOS ONE's style requirements, including those for file naming. The PLOS ONE style templates can be found at https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=wjVg/PLOSOne_formatting_sample_main_body.pdf and https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=ba62/PLOSOne_formatting_sample_title_authors_affiliations.pdf 2) Please include additional information regarding the survey or questionnaire used in the study and ensure that you have provided sufficient details that others could replicate the analyses. For instance, if you developed a questionnaire as part of this study and it is not under a copyright more restrictive than CC-BY, please include a copy, in both the original language and English, as Supporting Information. 3) Thank you for including your ethics statement: "A questionnaire survey was used for this study. Verbal consent was obtained from the Guanwu National Forest Recreation Area Management Office prior to the questionnaire survey. Consent was sought from the subjects when the questionnaire was administered. Verbal consent was obtained from accompanying parents for all minor subjects.". a. Please amend your current ethics statement to include the full name of the ethics committee/institutional review board(s) that approved your specific study. Once you have amended this/these statement(s) in the Methods section of the manuscript, please add the same text to the “Ethics Statement” field of the submission form (via “Edit Submission”). 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If you are unable to obtain permission from the original copyright holder to publish these figures under the CC BY 4.0 license or if the copyright holder’s requirements are incompatible with the CC BY 4.0 license, please either i) remove the figure or ii) supply a replacement figure that complies with the CC BY 4.0 license. Please check copyright information on all replacement figures and update the figure caption with source information. If applicable, please specify in the figure caption text when a figure is similar but not identical to the original image and is therefore for illustrative purposes only. The following resources for replacing copyrighted map figures may be helpful: USGS National Map Viewer (public domain): http://viewer.nationalmap.gov/viewer/ The Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth (public domain): http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/sseop/clickmap/ Maps at the CIA (public domain): https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/index.html and https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/cia-maps-publications/index.html NASA Earth Observatory (public domain): http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/ Landsat: http://landsat.visibleearth.nasa.gov/ USGS EROS (Earth Resources Observatory and Science (EROS) Center) (public domain): http://eros.usgs.gov/# Natural Earth (public domain): http://www.naturalearthdata.com/ [Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.] Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: Yes ******** 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: Yes ****** 3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). 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 ****** 4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE 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: This study sought to examine the perceptions of tourists towards their use of a national forest recreation area (NFRA) in Taiwan. The authors implemented a questionnaire of 500 tourists and analyzed their responses using t-tests, ANOVA and importance-performance analysis (IPA). There was a nice summary of the literature, but the way it was presented read more like a list of information than a narrative. Though the research is interesting, and I see potential in this paper, I have several concerns about it that lead me to not accept it for publication. I do want to commend the authors for undertaking this work without any specific funding support, as I understand how challenging that can be. Particular areas that need improvement include: further explanation of the methods, more technical reporting of results, and higher level interpretation of the implications of the results in the discussion. It also might be my personal preference, but I think the results should be separate from the discussion as it was difficult to distinguish between presentation and interpretation of results. I have gone into further detail about my specific recommendations below. Methods: I recommend including the entire survey questionnaire as supplemental information so as to assist with the replicability of the study and so readers can understand the variety of questions asked. Another recommendation I have is to provide more information about how the survey respondents were selected using convenience sampling, and include a citation to a reputable source that you used as a guide for the sampling (line 182). Please also include more information about what software(s) you used to generate the figures and conduct the statistical analyses. This will also aid in replicability. I am also curious about the response rates of the survey implementation, and what the authors did to reduce any bias in their sampling regime. About how many tourists visit the park each day and what proportion of that number was sampled? Did this study undergo any ethics review and how were the respondents given informed consent? There’s a lot missing here. I recommend reading more literature about quantitative survey design and presentation in natural resource management for guidance. Results: The paragraph beginning on line 251 seems like it would be better suited in the Methods as it describes evaluation of the survey questionnaire and analysis of the data. Lines 294-298 also should go in the Methods. I recommend improved presentation of survey results so it’s easier to visualize trends. Table 1 does a nice job of demonstrating the demographic snapshot of respondents, and these types of data are usually depicted in a table. However, I think the data presented in Tables 2 and 3 would be better viewed in a figure rather than a table. R Studio has a great Likert package to assist with visualizing Likert-style data, but I think you can also make stacked bar plots in Excel in a similar fashion, overlaying the percent of respondents who gave each answer. The data presented in Table 4 should also include the degrees of freedom (df) used in the analyses. Another suggestion for analyzing responses could be a Chi-square analysis. Also, where are the data stored? Please include that information in the manuscript. Some public (and free, I think) places are GitHub and Data Dryad. Discussion: Overall, the discussion of the implications of the results and applicability to the literature read more like a list of previous works rather than fitting the main conclusions of this study within the literature. One major suggestion I have is to break up the discussion into its own section and to make sure each paragraph has its own point to make. Each point from the paragraph should apply to a key finding of the study and how it fits in with the literature. I also recommend ending the paper with a very broad conclusion, not the limitations of the study. There is interesting information in here, but I think the paper falls short of presenting it in the best way to be understood. Depending on the responses of the other reviewers, I would be willing to read further versions of this manuscript. Reviewer #2: Firstly, all tables need to changes to the histograms because the reader needs to look at the comparison between the groups clearly. the title needs more concise. The abstract rewrites and mentions all the results that the researcher got them. finally, The references need to update. ****** 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. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review?** 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. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257835.r001
Revision 1
19 Jul 2021 Author Response Response to Reviewers Reviewers' comments: Reviewer's Responses to Questions Comments to the Author 1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: Yes ________________________________________ 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: No Reviewer #2: Yes ________________________________________ 3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). 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 ________________________________________ 4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE 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: This study sought to examine the perceptions of tourists towards their use of a national forest recreation area (NFRA) in Taiwan. The authors implemented a questionnaire of 500 tourists and analyzed their responses using t-tests, ANOVA and importance-performance analysis (IPA). There was a nice summary of the literature, but the way it was presented read more like a list of information than a narrative. Though the research is interesting, and I see potential in this paper, I have several concerns about it that lead me to not accept it for publication. I do want to commend the authors for undertaking this work without any specific funding support, as I understand how challenging that can be. Particular areas that need improvement include: further explanation of the methods, more technical reporting of results, and higher level interpretation of the implications of the results in the discussion. It also might be my personal preference, but I think the results should be separate from the discussion as it was difficult to distinguish between presentation and interpretation of results. I have gone into further detail about my specific recommendations below. Respones: We thank the reviewers for their valuable comments on this paper. The literature review and analysis methods have been supplemented according to the comments of the members. In addition, the results and the discussion have been written separately in this paper, and the presentation and explanation have been strengthened. Methods: I recommend including the entire survey questionnaire as supplemental information so as to assist with the replicability of the study and so readers can understand the variety of questions asked. Another recommendation I have is to provide more information about how the survey respondents were selected using convenience sampling, and include a citation to a reputable source that you used as a guide for the sampling (line 182). Please also include more information about what software(s) you used to generate the figures and conduct the statistical analyses. This will also aid in replicability. I am also curious about the response rates of the survey implementation, and what the authors did to reduce any bias in their sampling regime. About how many tourists visit the park each day and what proportion of that number was sampled? Did this study undergo any ethics review and how were the respondents given informed consent? There’s a lot missing here. I recommend reading more literature about quantitative survey design and presentation in natural resource management for guidance. Respones: 1. Due to the length of the paper, the content of the survey questionnaire is supplemented in the "Research Results" section. 2. As suggested by the reviewers, we supplemented the literature on the lobbying data and sampling methods. 3. As suggested by the reviewers, the description of data analysis methods is enhanced. Results: The paragraph beginning on line 251 seems like it would be better suited in the Methods as it describes evaluation of the survey questionnaire and analysis of the data. Lines 294-298 also should go in the Methods. I recommend improved presentation of survey results so it’s easier to visualize trends. Table 1 does a nice job of demonstrating the demographic snapshot of respondents, and these types of data are usually depicted in a table. However, I think the data presented in Tables 2 and 3 would be better viewed in a figure rather than a table. R Studio has a great Likert package to assist with visualizing Likert-style data, but I think you can also make stacked bar plots in Excel in a similar fashion, overlaying the percent of respondents who gave each answer. The data presented in Table 4 should also include the degrees of freedom (df) used in the analyses. Another suggestion for analyzing responses could be a Chi-square analysis. Also, where are the data stored? Please include that information in the manuscript. Some public (and free, I think) places are GitHub and Data Dryad. Respones: 1. Some of the results were adjusted to the Research methods section according to the comments of the members. 2. 2. Some of the table contents are presented in graphical form. 3. Results and discussion are written separately. Discussion: Overall, the discussion of the implications of the results and applicability to the literature read more like a list of previous works rather than fitting the main conclusions of this study within the literature. One major suggestion I have is to break up the discussion into its own section and to make sure each paragraph has its own point to make. Each point from the paragraph should apply to a key finding of the study and how it fits in with the literature. I also recommend ending the paper with a very broad conclusion, not the limitations of the study. There is interesting information in here, but I think the paper falls short of presenting it in the best way to be understood. Depending on the responses of the other reviewers, I would be willing to read further versions of this manuscript. Respones: We thank the reviewers for their valuable comments, and this paper has been supplemented with discussion based on their comments, and the conclusions of the study have been rewritten. Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: Response to Reviewers.DOCX https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257835.r002
4 Aug 2021 Decision Letter - Shah Md Atiqul Haq, Editor PONE-D-21-12141R1 Perceptions of tourists of the resources , ecological service functions and recreation value of the Guanwu National Forest Recreation Area PLOS ONE Dear Dr. Chen, Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’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 6 weeks. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ 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 academic 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'. If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter. If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols. We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript. Kind regards, Shah Md Atiqul Haq Academic Editor PLOS ONE 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: Dear authors, I would ask you to revise the paper by following the reviewers' comments and suggestions. Best wishes [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: (No Response) ******** 2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes ****** 3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes ****** 4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). 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 ****** 5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE 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 ****** 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: I want to thank the authors for their substantial edits to their manuscript, which I think strengthened the study overall. I admire their revision of the Results section, especially the detail devoted to making new figures depicting the results, and the addition of a Discussion section. Below, I outline several additional recommendations to continue to strengthen the manuscript: 1. Reference the supplemental information (like the survey questionnaire, the data, etc.) when it is mentioned in the manuscript. For example, you mention the survey questionnaire at lines 169-173, but do not reference where in the supplemental information the survey is. Please do this so the reader knows where to look. 2. Please explain the number of respondents you tried to interview, and the response rate of the interviews in the paragraph that begins at line 184. I know you added more references to support convenience sampling, and I appreciate that you mentioned the number of total questionnaires completed. However, an important missing piece is reporting the total number of interviews you tried to do, so we know the response rate (i.e. if you tried talking to 1000 people, but only had 500 questionnaires completed, that would be a 50% response rate). Reporting on this assists with replicability if other researchers want to do a similar study in their national park(s). 3. Please include which software you used for data processing and analysis (beginning at line 198). 4. Please include explanation of all panels in all figure descriptions. For example, Figure 1 has 10 panels and is separated into two sections (“Recreation behaviors” and “Resource evaluation”), so please describe the different panels in more detail in the figure descriptions. Figure 3 especially requires more explanation in the description as it appears to be a multidimensional plot; please describe what was displayed in the plot and what the axes represent. I have no idea how to interpret this plot otherwise. 5. I think the Discussion and Conclusions should be combined, with the details in the Conclusion included first as they summarize the key points from the study. Then, you can start to apply the main findings to the broader literature and discuss any limitations from your study. How the Discussion and Conclusions are depicted right now makes it hard to understand the key findings of the study, as they are presented after connecting it to the literature. Please rewrite. If you want to keep a Conclusions section, stick to one paragraph and summarize everything there. But only after you summarize the key findings in more detail earlier in the paper. I see the value in getting this paper published, but there are still some limitations to me accepting it as is. I am willing to review the paper one more time if the above points are addressed. Thank you. ****** 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. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review?** For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: 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. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257835.r003
Revision 2
21 Aug 2021 Author Response 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: I want to thank the authors for their substantial edits to their manuscript, which I think strengthened the study overall. I admire their revision of the Results section, especially the detail devoted to making new figures depicting the results, and the addition of a Discussion section. Below, I outline several additional recommendations to continue to strengthen the manuscript: 1. Reference the supplemental information (like the survey questionnaire, the data, etc.) when it is mentioned in the manuscript. For example, you mention the survey questionnaire at lines 169-173, but do not reference where in the supplemental information the survey is. Please do this so the reader knows where to look. Respones: The location of the supplemental information has been added, see line 171-172. 2. Please explain the number of respondents you tried to interview, and the response rate of the interviews in the paragraph that begins at line 184. I know you added more references to support convenience sampling, and I appreciate that you mentioned the number of total questionnaires completed. However, an important missing piece is reporting the total number of interviews you tried to do, so we know the response rate (i.e. if you tried talking to 1000 people, but only had 500 questionnaires completed, that would be a 50% response rate). Reporting on this assists with replicability if other researchers want to do a similar study in their national park(s). Respones: According to the statistics of interviewers, the response rate for this study was 55%, see line 192-193. 3. Please include which software you used for data processing and analysis (beginning at line 198). Respones: We have added the adopted software, see line 213-215. 4. Please include explanation of all panels in all figure descriptions. For example, Figure 1 has 10 panels and is separated into two sections (“Recreation behaviors” and “Resource evaluation”), so please describe the different panels in more detail in the figure descriptions. Figure 3 especially requires more explanation in the description as it appears to be a multidimensional plot; please describe what was displayed in the plot and what the axes represent. I have no idea how to interpret this plot otherwise. Respones: The illustrations in Figure 1 and Figure 3 have been corrected, see line 277-283 and line 350-353. 5. I think the Discussion and Conclusions should be combined, with the details in the Conclusion included first as they summarize the key points from the study. Then, you can start to apply the main findings to the broader literature and discuss any limitations from your study. How the Discussion and Conclusions are depicted right now makes it hard to understand the key findings of the study, as they are presented after connecting it to the literature. Please rewrite. If you want to keep a Conclusions section, stick to one paragraph and summarize everything there. But only after you summarize the key findings in more detail earlier in the paper. I see the value in getting this paper published, but there are still some limitations to me accepting it as is. I am willing to review the paper one more time if the above points are addressed. Thank you. Respones: We still keep a Conclusions section, and strengthen the content of the Discussion section, and strengthen the linkage between Discussion and Conclusions. Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: Response-to-Reviewers20210818.docx https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257835.r004
13 Sep 2021 Decision Letter - Shah Md Atiqul Haq, Editor Perceptions of tourists of the resources , ecological service functions and recreation value of the Guanwu National Forest Recreation Area PONE-D-21-12141R2 Dear Dr. Jan-Chang Chen, We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements. Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication. An invoice for payment will follow shortly after the formal acceptance. To ensure an efficient process, please log into Editorial Manager at http://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/, click the 'Update My Information' link at the top of the page, and double check that your user information is up-to-date. If you have any billing related questions, please contact our Author Billing department directly at authorbilling@plos.org. 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 onepress@plos.org. Kind regards, Shah Md Atiqul Haq Academic Editor PLOS ONE Additional Editor Comments (optional): Congratulations!! The article has been accepted now. 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 ******** 2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented. Reviewer #1: Yes ****** 3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes ****** 4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available? The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). 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 ****** 5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English? PLOS ONE 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 ****** 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: Thank you for your revisions to the paper. I am looking forward to seeing it published soon. Please be sure to include high-definition versions of all figures, though, as some of them are a bit blurry in your submission. ****** 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. If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public. Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review?** For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy. Reviewer #1: No https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257835.r005
Formally Accepted
22 Sep 2021 Acceptance Letter - Shah Md Atiqul Haq, Editor PONE-D-21-12141R2 Perceptions of tourists of the resources, ecological service functions and recreation value of the Guanwu National Forest Recreation Area Dear Dr. Chen: I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now with our production department. If your institution or institutions have a press office, please let them know about your upcoming paper now to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team within the next 48 hours. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information please contact onepress@plos.org. If we can help with anything else, please email us at plosone@plos.org. Thank you for submitting your work to PLOS ONE and supporting open access. Kind regards, PLOS ONE Editorial Office Staff on behalf of Dr. Shah Md Atiqul Haq Academic Editor PLOS ONE https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0257835.r006

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