Natural soundscapes enhance mood recovery amid anthropogenic noise pollution

Lia R. V. Gilmour; Isabelle Bray; Chris Alford; Paul R. Lintott

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0311487

Peer Review History

Original SubmissionMarch 8, 2024
24 May 2024 Decision Letter - Yuan Zhang, Editor PONE-D-24-08824Natural Soundscapes Enhance Mood Recovery Amid Anthropogenic Noise PollutionPLOS ONE Dear Dr. Lintott, 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 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 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: https://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, Yuan Zhang, PhD Academic Editor PLOS ONE 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. When completing the data availability statement of the submission form, you indicated that you will make your data available on acceptance. We strongly recommend all authors decide on a data sharing plan before acceptance, as the process can be lengthy and hold up publication timelines. Please note that, though access restrictions are acceptable now, your entire data will need to be made freely accessible if your manuscript is accepted for publication. This policy applies to all data except where public deposition would breach compliance with the protocol approved by your research ethics board. If you are unable to adhere to our open data policy, please kindly revise your statement to explain your reasoning and we will seek the editor's input on an exemption. Please be assured that, once you have provided your new statement, the assessment of your exemption will not hold up the peer review process. 3. Please include captions for your Supporting Information files at the end of your manuscript, and update any in-text citations to match accordingly. Please see our Supporting Information guidelines for more information: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/supporting-information. [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: Partly Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Partly ******** 2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: No ****** 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 Reviewer #3: 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 Reviewer #3: No ****** 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: It is an interesting paper that creatively included the investigations of the effect of traffic speeds on psychological responses to natural sounds. The study objectives are explicit, and the following works align well with such goals. The expression of this manuscript is logically clear and well-written, making the readers understand easily. However, I personally think the results of this study have not been exhibited, analyzed, and explained thoroughly. Also, the current contents are more narrative-like, lacking deep discussions of the phenomena found in the results. These aspects are really suggested for further improvement. Please see the detailed comments as follows. Line 73-74 Due to the change in the subject of the description, the logical relationship before and after this sentence does not seem obvious. The link could be strengthened by modifying the formulation. Line 81 Is it necessary to use the term “natural sounds” if the study only included and examined birdsongs? Line 114 More details of the experiment are suggested to indicate clearly. For instance, how did the authors control the device condition, like sound volumes, of the participants’ sides? Is it possible that the conditions are different from person to person? Because it seems to be an online experiment conducted in this study, and the objects did not have to be somewhere (e.g., a room or lab) to participate in the experiment in person. Line 171 The authors should indicate in this section why they preferred to use these models for data analysis. Line 231 Some phenomena found in the results can be discussed more instead of simply describing them in this section. For instance, in Line 260, what is the possible reason for the lack of significant difference in stress levels between birdsong and birdsong with 20mi/h noise hearing? Furthermore, the authors included some demographic factors in the analysis, but why were such factors not mentioned in this section? Even though they were insignificant in the models, the potential reasons or mechanisms can still be analyzed or speculated reasonably. Line 235 The wording should be more concrete here. The present study does indicate the effect of birdsongs, a part/type of natural sounds/soundscapes, on stress and anxiety. However, the other types of natural sounds or soundscapes were not examined in this work, so this general term is not suggested here. Please check the whole manuscript to see whether there are similar cases. Line282 The limitations of this study should also be stated. Reviewer #2: The manuscript presents an interesting study assessing to what extend self-reported anxiety, stress and pleasure are affected by natural soundscapes (bird song) and traffic noise at different speed limits. The paper is well written and might be a relevant contribution to the field because the effect of speed limit has been largely understudied. The provided evidence is also very useful for urban planning. Overall, this paper is of high quality. There are some minor points to be considered before its publication: Introduction is well-written and concise. However, the first paragraph is very broad. I would suggest to reduce or even omit it, and expand on the actual focus of the study, so to broaden on the soundscape part (paragraph two) on how soundscapes have been used in health and well-being studies before, while strengthening on what contributions and novelty the presented approach brings. Lines 83-87: You also test for the effect of different background characteristics such as nature preference, pleas add here. I think adding a short paragraph on how socio-cultural characteristics have been studied before in soundscape-well-being studies will also justify more clearly the chose of variables in the questionnaire Line 114: In the experimental design section, please state if randomization was used and in what ways. This information can be found only in the Supplementary, but I think it is important to clarify in the methods main text as well. In fact, figure S1 of the experimental procedure is really informative and clear and I would suggest including it in the main body of the article, not as part of the Supplementary, if possible Stressors: if this is an established and validated stressor method, please add the reference Line 165, Why did you ask about where participants grew up, please justify and add reference? In general, related to my previous comment, it would be better to connect the questions you have used with previous literature to justify the choice of your socio-demographic variables. Please add references and relate previous research studying such associations wherever possible In the statistical analysis, did you somehow account for the order of the sound interventions (bird, bird + 20mi/h, bird + 40mi/h)? although they were randomized, accounting for the order effect in the model is important Line 182: What do you mean by “non-experimental data” isn’t all data used in the experiment? Also, it is unclear in the methods description why you chose some of the demographic characteristics to be included in the models and others are omitted. In general, the difference in the aim/research question/hypothesis between the LMM and GLMM model is not very clear, especially the GLMM needs better explanation. Line 184 -185 Why do you treat listening device (especially the latter) as a response variable? Please clarify The results and discussion are well-written and concise. However, please add a short paragraph discussing study limitations. Please also add future directions for research, currently future recommendations are related only to planning Reviewer #3: The study examines the impact of natural soundscapes, such as bird song, and the addition of traffic noise at different speeds (20 mi/h and 40 mi/h) on mood in urbanized environments where green spaces are scarce and exposure to anthropogenic noise is high. Reviewer Comments: 1.The current review lacks sufficient depth regarding conclusions drawn from previous studies that combine traffic noise with natural sounds. Please expand the review to include a more comprehensive analysis of existing literature on this topic. 2.The manuscript does not provide a clear rationale for selecting 68 participants. Please elaborate on the selection criteria and the methods used to determine and verify the adequacy of this sample size. 3.There is a lack of detail regarding the duration of rest periods for subjects under different conditions. Please specify how long the subjects rested in each condition. 4.It would be beneficial to include Figure S1 in the main text and to add photos of the experimental scenes to provide clearer context and enhance the reader's understanding.、 5.The manuscript should clarify the relationships between the various scales used. Specifically, provide details on the relationship between STAI-T and STAI, and how these scales are interrelated in the context of the study. 6.The horizontal axis of Figure 2 is not clearly labeled. Please provide a clear and descriptive label for the horizontal axis. 7.The study mentions audio collection on two speed-limited roads but does not detail the traffic volume and vehicle type ratio on these roads. Please include this information and discuss whether it was considered during audio collection. ****** 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 Reviewer #3: 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.0311487.r001
Revision 1
12 Aug 2024 Author Response Response to Reviewers' comments We have provided a response in bold underneath each reviewer’s comment and indicated the line number of any changes in the revised manuscript. Excepts are provided for ease of reference to changes in the manuscript. Reviewer #1 (R1) It is an interesting paper that creatively included the investigations of the effect of traffic speeds on psychological responses to natural sounds. The study objectives are explicit, and the following works align well with such goals. The expression of this manuscript is logically clear and well-written, making the readers understand easily. However, I personally think the results of this study have not been exhibited, analyzed, and explained thoroughly. Also, the current contents are more narrative-like, lacking deep discussions of the phenomena found in the results. These aspects are really suggested for further improvement. Please see the detailed comments as follows. We thank R1 for their positive comments regarding the study objectives and we welcome their feedback on the way the results have been presented, analysed and discussed. We believe the changes made in line with the feedback from R1 has made the manuscript a stronger contribution to the field and more widely applicable. Line 73-74 Due to the change in the subject of the description, the logical relationship before and after this sentence does not seem obvious. The link could be strengthened by modifying the formulation. We agree, and have moved the line lower down the paragraph to L81-83 Line 81 Is it necessary to use the term “natural sounds” if the study only included and examined birdsongs? We thank the reviewer for picking this up. We have reviewed the whole manuscript and made our wording consistent throughout. Our study included soundscapes created from a natural soundscape recorded at a rewilded site during dawn chorus, including bird song and an urban soundscape including traffic noise recorded on two roads, one with 20mi/h traffic and one with 40 mi/hr traffic. A soundscape is different from sounds e.g. bird song or car noises recorded in isolation, as it represents the multi-layered soundscape you get with birds singing at different distances and the echoes from objects in the environment, all contributing to the experience of the soundscape. However, we agree the use of the term “natural sounds” was misleading. We have removed the reference to natural sounds throughout the manuscript and made sure we refer to natural soundscapes throughout. We have also included ‘including bird song’, or ‘including 20/40 mi/hr traffic noise’ where appropriate, to make it clear that the natural soundscapes included bird song and the anthropogenic/urban soundscape included traffic noise. We have also changed the names of the treatments throughout the manuscript, for clarity. The conditions are now Natural soundscape (previously bird only) and mixed 20 and mixed 40 treatments for the mixed soundscapes with natural soundscapes with 20 and 40 mi/h traffic noise added (previously bird + 20 and bird + 40 mi/hr). Line 114 More details of the experiment are suggested to indicate clearly. For instance, how did the authors control the device condition, like sound volumes, of the participants’ sides? Is it possible that the conditions are different from person to person? Because it seems to be an online experiment conducted in this study, and the objects did not have to be somewhere (e.g., a room or lab) to participate in the experiment in person. We thank R1 for raising this. We did indeed attempt to control the sound volume as much as possible given that participants were doing the experiment at home at their computers or laptops. We asked that participants use ear cancelling headphones if available, or in ear headphones at the least. We also did a sound test before starting the experiment. We have added these details into the methods. L138-144: “Before starting the experiment, participants were asked about their mood in general (see Subjective Measures below), and then asked to do a sound test. During the sound test, participants were asked to put on their headphones, and click a test link that played some sounds of human talking. They were then asked to adjust their headphones to a level that was comfortable, but loud enough to immerse themselves in the sounds. Talking was chosen as the test sound as it was sufficiently different from the sounds used in the main experiment.” Line 171 The authors should indicate in this section why they preferred to use these models for data analysis. We used mixed models in both cases as it allowed us to include random effects in our models. This allowed us to control for any inherent mood differences among participants via the random effect of participant number. For clarity we have included the following on L228-230: “Using this mixed modelling method allowed us to control for order of the fixed factor effects soundscape and stressor as well as any inherent variation in stress, hedonic tone and anxiety amongst participants.” Line 231 Some phenomena found in the results can be discussed more instead of simply describing them in this section. For instance, in Line 260, what is the possible reason for the lack of significant difference in stress levels between birdsong and birdsong with 20mi/h noise hearing? We agree that more detail examining the results would be helpful in determining the wider narrative. We used two subjective mood state measures in this experiment, and state the reasoning for this in the methods L166-167: “Two measures were used to ensure internal consistency in the experiment (i.e. if scores from the two measures mirrored each other, then they were both more likely a true representation of mood).” All three measures of mood- subjective anxiety, stress and hedonic tone (pleasure) were significantly different between soundscape treatments. However, on closer comparison, STAI anxiety scores show a significant difference between treatments, e.g. natural soundscape and mixed 20mi/hr, whereas UWIST MACL stress scores do not. There may be some power loss due to accounting for multiple comparisons. More likely is a difference in sensitivity between the tests. We have included this explanation and included reference to the supplementary figures showing the mood items in each Likert scale. Both measures show the same trend however, but one is perhaps more sensitive in picking up the nuances of mood differences felt by participants between the treatments. We have added an explanation to L305-320. Furthermore, the authors included some demographic factors in the analysis, but why were such factors not mentioned in this section? Even though they were insignificant in the models, the potential reasons or mechanisms can still be analyzed or speculated reasonably. We thank R1 for the suggestion and have added in reference to the demographic factors in the aims section of the introduction and into the discussion. We have also added a discussion of the limitations of the study and included reference to demographics and other participant information. Line 235 The wording should be more concrete here. The present study does indicate the effect of birdsongs, a part/type of natural sounds/soundscapes, on stress and anxiety. However, the other types of natural sounds or soundscapes were not examined in this work, so this general term is not suggested here. Please check the whole manuscript to see whether there are similar cases. We thank R1 for their comment and refer them back to our earlier response regarding use of the term natural soundscapes vs natural sounds. We acknowledge that we did not test other types of natural soundscapes, and have made this clear throughout the manuscript. Line282 The limitations of this study should also be stated. We have added a section at the end of the discussion that includes limitations of the current study, future research directions and recommendations based on this study. L343-366 Reviewer #2 (R2) The manuscript presents an interesting study assessing to what extend self-reported anxiety, stress and pleasure are affected by natural soundscapes (bird song) and traffic noise at different speed limits. The paper is well written and might be a relevant contribution to the field because the effect of speed limit has been largely understudied. The provided evidence is also very useful for urban planning. Overall, this paper is of high quality. There are some minor points to be considered before its publication: We thank R2 for their positive comments about the manuscript, especially that it is of high quality and will have use in urban planning. Introduction is well-written and concise. However, the first paragraph is very broad. I would suggest to reduce or even omit it, and expand on the actual focus of the study, so to broaden on the soundscape part (paragraph two) on how soundscapes have been used in health and well-being studies before, while strengthening on what contributions and novelty the presented approach brings. We thank R2 for this suggestion and have reduce paragraph one in the introduction accordingly. We have also expanded on paragraph two, including examples of studies including exposure to natural sounds and anthropogenic sounds. We have also made it clearer how our study is novel in comparison to what has been done before. Lines 83-87: You also test for the effect of different background characteristics such as nature preference, pleas add here. I think adding a short paragraph on how socio-cultural characteristics have been studied before in soundscape-well-being studies will also justify more clearly the chose of variables in the questionnaire We have added the line: “We also tested whether general mood state, age, gender and inherent preference for natural environments affected mood recovery in response to natural and mixed natural and anthropogenic soundscapes.” L92-94 We have also added in a line introducing the influence of demographic and other factors in determining response to nature and natural soundscapes: “Responses to nature, including natural soundscapes, may also be dependent on factors such as age, sex and socio-cultural experience e.g. childhood connection to nature (Hughes et al. 2018, Shu and Ma, 2020, Ge et al. 2023), though more research is needed to understand and tease apart the influence of these factors.” L53-56 Line 114: In the experimental design section, please state if randomization was used and in what ways. This information can be found only in the Supplementary, but I think it is important to clarify in the methods main text as well. In fact, figure S1 of the experimental procedure is really informative and clear and I would suggest including it in the main body of the article, not as part of the Supplementary, if possible We agree and have included Figure S1 as a figure in the main text (now Figure 1). We have also included the following line for clarity on randomisation: “The order of soundscapes was randomised between participants, but the stressor videos were not (Figure 1). Soundscapes were randomised to control for any order effects, with each participant exposed to all three soundscapes as part of the repeated measures design.” L149-151 Stressors: if this is an established and validated stressor method, please add the reference We based our stressor method on similar previous studies. Reference to these studies has been added to the methods section. L154 Line 165, Why did you ask about where participants grew up, please justify and add reference? In general, related to my previous comment, it would be better to connect the questions you have used with previous literature to justify the choice of your socio-demographic variables. Please add references and relate previous research studying such associations wherever possible We included this question to understand the bias that may exist in the participant pool we were sampling from, i.e. students that were at university in an urban environment. Many similar studies in fields related to this research use student participants, however, we wanted to be able to discuss the limitations of our participant sample. We have now added a section discussing limitations and referenced these factors. We have also clarified the collection of participant information in the methods. We have added a section discussing limitations, future research and recommendations from the study. L343 In the statistical analysis, did you somehow account for the order of the sound interventions (bird, bird + 20mi/h, bird + 40mi/h)? although they were randomized, accounting for the order effect in the model is important The order of soundscapes was randomised between participants, but the stressor videos were not (Figure 1). Soundscapes were randomised to control for any order effects, with each participant exposed to all three soundscapes as part of the repeated measures design.” L149-151 “Each participant was exposed to all stressors and all soundscapes. However, soundscape order was randomised within the Qualtrics software, whereas stressor order was not. We therefore included stressor identifier (factor variable with levels: A, B, C) as a fixed effect in the full model to control for any effect of stressor type or order on the outcome measures. We also chose to use mixed effect models due to their ability to include random effects (as well as fixed effects) and included the random effect of participant number. Using this mixed modelling method allowed us to control for order of the fixed factor effects soundscape and stressor as well as any inherent variation in stress, hedonic tone and anxiety amongst participants.” L222-230 Line 182: What do you mean by “non-experimental data” isn’t all data used in the experiment? By this we mean any data collected before the experimental playback. We have made this clearer throughout the methods and results sections. Also, it is unclear in the methods description why you chose some of the demographic characteristics to be included in the models and others are omitted. In general, the difference in the aim/research question/hypothesis between the LMM and GLMM model is not very clear, especially the GLMM needs better explanation. We have rewritten the methods for the statistical analysis to make the whole section clearer and included an explanation of why the chosen variables were used in the analysis. We have also added some info that was missing into the Participant info and demographics section in the results. Line 184 -185 Why do you treat listening device (especially the latter) as a response variable? Please clarify We have removed this section as it was confusing. The main analysis includes a subset of “participant information” including demographic data, trait anxiety scores and preference for natural environments (see previous points). The results and discussion are well-written and concise. However, please add a short paragraph discussing study limitations. Please also add future directions for research, currently future recommendations are related only to planning We have added a section discussing limitations, future research and recommendations from the study. L343 Reviewer #3 (R3) The study examines the impact of natural soundscapes, such as bird song, and the addition of traffic noise at different speeds (20 mi/h and 40 mi/h) on mood in urbanized environments where green spaces are scarce and exposure to anthropogenic noise is high. We thank R3 for their comments and recommendations to improve the manuscript. Reviewer Comments: 1.The current review lacks sufficient depth regarding conclusions drawn from previous studies that combine traffic noise with natural sounds. Please expand the review to include a more comprehensive analysis of existing literature on this topic. We have expanded the introduction to include a more thorough examination of previous studies. 2.The manuscript does not provide a clear rationale for selecting 68 participants. Please elaborate on the selection criteria and the methods used to determine and verify the adequacy of this sample size. Similar studies had between 40 and around 180 participants (see examples below), so w Attachments Attachment Submitted filename: PONE_response_to_reviewers.docx https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0311487.r002
20 Sep 2024 Decision Letter - Yuan Zhang, Editor Natural Soundscapes Enhance Mood Recovery Amid Anthropogenic Noise Pollution PONE-D-24-08824R1 Dear Dr. Lintott, 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 will be generated when your article is formally accepted. Please note, if your institution has a publishing partnership with PLOS and your article meets the relevant criteria, all or part of your publication costs will be covered. Please make sure your user information is up-to-date by logging into Editorial Manager at Editorial Manager® and clicking the ‘Update My Information' link at the top of the page. If you have any questions relating to publication charges, 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, Yuan Zhang, PhD Academic Editor PLOS ONE Additional Editor Comments (optional): 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: All comments have been addressed Reviewer #3: 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 Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: Yes ****** 3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? Reviewer #1: Yes Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: 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: (No Response) Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: 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 Reviewer #2: Yes Reviewer #3: 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: (No Response) Reviewer #2: (No Response) Reviewer #3: (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. 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 Reviewer #3: No ******** https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0311487.r003
Formally Accepted
25 Oct 2024 Acceptance Letter - Yuan Zhang, Editor PONE-D-24-08824R1 PLOS ONE Dear Dr. Lintott, I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now being handed over to our production team. At this stage, our production department will prepare your paper for publication. This includes ensuring the following: * All references, tables, and figures are properly cited * All relevant supporting information is included in the manuscript submission, * There are no issues that prevent the paper from being properly typeset If revisions are needed, the production department will contact you directly to resolve them. If no revisions are needed, you will receive an email when the publication date has been set. At this time, we do not offer pre-publication proofs to authors during production of the accepted work. Please keep in mind that we are working through a large volume of accepted articles, so please give us a few weeks to review your paper and let you know the next and final steps. Lastly, 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 customercare@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 Professor Yuan Zhang Academic Editor PLOS ONE https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0311487.r004

Open letter on the publication of peer review reports

PLOS recognizes the benefits of transparency in the peer review process. Therefore, we enable the publication of all of the content of peer review and author responses alongside final, published articles. Reviewers remain anonymous, unless they choose to reveal their names.

We encourage other journals to join us in this initiative. We hope that our action inspires the community, including researchers, research funders, and research institutions, to recognize the benefits of published peer review reports for all parts of the research system.

Learn more at ASAPbio .