Applying the DEMATEL Method to Evaluate Social Media Criteria in Promoting Sustainable Health Behavior—A Case Study of Vegetarian Diet Promotion by a Non-Profit Organization
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
My recommendations for revision are following:
- research questions are missing. It is necessary to add them to the part Materials and Methods.
- According to the previous research papers describing the DEMATEL method, there is no limit particularly the lower limit in the number of experts in the decision-making process when the DEMATEL method is applied. However, the experts in the field have to be involved in this method. I recommend to extend the information about the sample of volunteers. For the predictive value of this method it is necessary that the questionnaire is answered by experts in the field.
- please, correct the numbering in the part Discussion.
Author Response
Response to Reviewer 1 Comments
I would like to thank the reviewer for careful and thorough reading of this manuscript and for the thoughtful comments and constructive suggestions, which help to improve the quality of this manuscript. My responses are as it follows:
Point 1: Research questions are missing. It is necessary to add them to the part Materials and Methods.
Response 1: Thank you for the comment. The research questions have been added in the fourth paragraph of the introduction part and are highlighted in yellow.
Point 2: According to the previous research papers describing the DEMATEL method, there is no limit particularly the lower limit in the number of experts in the decision-making process when the DEMATEL method is applied. However, the experts in the field have to be involved in this method. I recommend to extend the information about the sample of volunteers. For the predictive value of this method it is necessary that the questionnaire is answered by experts in the field.
Response 2: Thank you very much for the recommendation. We deleted the statement about the minimum sample size of respondents in DEMATEL. More information justifying the expert knowledge of the respondents have been added to the paragraph under Section 3.2. Moreover, the requirement of the experts were defined. The respondent should have more than 15 years participation in health promotion using social media with five years of which involved managerial position for the organization.
Point 3: Please, correct the numbering in the part Discussion.
Response 3: Thank you for the correction notice. The numbering was corrected and the changed numbers are highlighted in yellow.
Reviewer 2 Report
An interesting and well written report of the studey. While the methodology is well introduced and supports the discussion and findings, the the value of the study is challenged by the lack of clarity about what is the research question. The report title proposes "Applying the DEMATEL method to evaluate social media criteria in promoting sustainable health behavior" when in fact the study is limited to a survey of experts in promoting vegetarianism. This then extends to an obviuos influence over the responses to Criteria 2.2.1 Emotional Connection and 2.2.4 Cultural Considerations ie the social media audience that have no interest in vegetarianism are unlikely to take seriously of engage in any social campaign by the NGO advocating vegetarianism which is not reflected in the survey. This is an obvious limitation to the study.
In summary, the limitation of the survey needs to be achnowledged, and the research question and report title need to make specific reference to its application to social media in relation to promotion of vegetarianism.
The option is to conduct the survey across a panel of experts from NGO's that are not circumstance specific.
Author Response
Response to Reviewer 2 Comments
Point 1: The value of the study is challenged by the lack of clarity about what is the research question. The report title proposes "Applying the DEMATEL method to evaluate social media criteria in promoting sustainable health behavior" when in fact the study is limited to a survey of experts in promoting vegetarianism. This then extends to an obvious influence over the responses to Criteria 2.2.1 Emotional Connection and 2.2.4 Cultural Considerations the social media audience that have no interest in vegetarianism are unlikely to take seriously of engage in any social campaign by the NGO advocating vegetarianism which is not reflected in the survey. This is an obvious limitation to the study.
Response 1: Thank you for the careful review and attention to details. I revised the title of the paper to reflect that the data was drawn from respondents participating in vegetarian diet promotion. In addition, I revised the research objective (paragraph 2) to reflect the vegetarian diet promotion context. I have also added a statement explaining that the data was collected from respondents working in vegetarian diet promotion after the specific research questions in the fourth paragraph of the introduction section.
Point 2: In summary, the limitation of the survey needs to be acknowledged, and the research question and report title need to make specific reference to its application to social media in relation to promotion of vegetarianism. The option is to conduct the survey across a panel of experts from NGO's that are not circumstance specific.
Response 2: Thank you very much. The comments are extremely precise. I also agree that the circumstance specificity of my findings could limit the generalisability to other health issues. Due to the time constraint, I won’t be able to conduct a survey among experts of NGOs in various sects of the health sector. I have therefore included circumstance specificity as a limitation of my study and added the recommendation that future research examine the determinants of health promotion success of other health issues (see the final paragraph of the conclusion section).
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
I have no more suggestions or comments for author.
Reviewer 2 Report
Revision address my original concerns, thanks.
