Evaluation of Rural Human Settlement Development Quality and Impact Analysis: Empirical Evidence from China’s Micro Survey?
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe exact reference must be included when there are direct quotations. The direct mention of the Chinese president may imply some bias in the research, so I suggest a review to refine this aspect in order to present the document with greater objectivity.
The characterization of the phenomenon is appropriate, based on the literature review.
A location map of the studied areas is missing to recognize their impact and relation to the presented context. Additionally, some details on the relationships between settlements, villages, and cities are mentioned but not expressed spatially, making it difficult to understand the territorial characteristics of the analysis.
Figure 1 could be improved if all text were aligned horizontally, making it easier to read. Also, include the final "t" in "developmen".
The "Engel coefficient of village residents" is not defined or explained as an indicator to measure living standards.
I suggest that before Table 3, an explanation is provided on how the rating scales are obtained. In the following paragraph, the decimals seem to indicate percentages of the total surveys, but it is not clearly stated if that is the case.
In "the entropy method," the interpretation of the results needs clarification. At some point, it is mentioned that a result means "medium," but no system of criteria is presented to clearly interpret the results in Table 4 beyond what the authors state.
In Table 5, a rating scale is missing to allow for a clearer interpretation of the results.
It would be important to review the data collection sources to enable verification and facilitate the possibility of replicating the study in other locations. However, the conclusion states that "the raw data cannot be provided," which is a major deficiency in verifying the study’s characteristics.
A comparison strategy is missing between the implementation of policies in 2018 and the time of analysis to assess the degree of transformation resulting from them.
Comments on the Quality of English LanguageFigure 1 could be improved if all text were aligned horizontally, making it easier to read. Also, include the final "t" in "developmen".
Author Response
Thank you very much for the valuable suggestions provided by the reviewer. The specific modifications are included in the PDF file. Once again, thank you!
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsOverall, the article is certainly scientific in nature. The authors have demonstrated the ability to operate with modern research methods and interpret the results obtained. However, this interpretation is not complete in the sense of formulating specific conclusions and constructing specific targeted recommendations on their basis.
The article does not provide any justification for why exactly “this study divides the economic development dimension into three aspects: agricultural economy, labor migration, and living standard…”, because in reality there are many more such aspects.
The same remark applies to the “Living Facilities Dimension” (“three aspects:…” - why exactly three?), as well as the “Public Services Dimension” (“four aspects:…” - why exactly four?) and the “Sanitation Environment Dimension” (“four aspects:…” - why exactly four? And why exactly the aspects, given by the authors, were chosen by them?
The article does not indicate whether micro-survey data from 108 villages in Hubei, Shandong, and Jilin provinces are sufficient to achieve the research goals (which are not clearly defined and can only be guessed at). That is, whether the surveyed objects are a sufficient statistical sample for conducting research, the results of which can be exposed to a larger territory, given the scale of such a large and powerful country as China.
There is also no justification for the choice of "explanatory variables are selected from four aspects:..." - why four and why these?
Main disadvantages (comments):
The article would be much better if the abstract specifically stated «The purpose of conducted research was... The main tasks performed during the research to achieve the stated purpose were:..». Similar things should be substantiated in the introduction.
The conclusions are not specific and are not clearly linked to the research conducted. Conclusions such as “…encourage villages to establish public management committees and village self-governance organizations to strengthen internal community cohesion and cooperation, collectively advancing environmental governance and the improvement of public services” do not, in principle, require such complex and comprehensive research for their formulation. And the conclusions presented here are mostly of the same nature. Let’s take a look:
“First, the rural living environment quality scores in Hubei, Shandong, and Jilin provinces are at a mid-to-low level, with little difference among the three provinces, indicating significant potential for improvement and remaining as a prominent shortcoming in rural revitalization” - so what?
"Second, among the various dimensions of rural living environment quality, the scores for economic development and public services are relatively high, while the scores for living facilities and sanitation environment are lower, reflecting the long-term inertia of resource allocation and the lagging effects of emerging project evaluations" - so what?
"Third, the baseline and quantile regression analyzes of the influencing factors of rural living environment quality reveal that village economic characteristics, population characteristics, public management characteristics, and price characteristics are important factors currently affecting rural living environment quality" - so what?
That is, it is not clear from the conclusions what the significance of the results obtained during the study is, what exactly and who should do based on these results.Similarly, “based on the above conclusions, to improve the quality of rural living environments and achieve the goal of ecological livability, the policy recommendations proposed in this study” also do not have a specific nature: “adopt a localized approach and formulate differentiated policies…optimize resource allocation and balance the development of various dimensions…promote diversified economic development and enhance rural economic resilience…improve the efficiency of public services and strengthen grassroots governance capabilities”. That is, it would be advisable to find some other form of presenting recommendations that would be based on a more specific expression of the results obtained, related to the results of the calculations, because at the moment the impression is that the calculations are in themselves, and the conclusions and recommendations are in themselves.
Author Response
Thank you very much for the valuable suggestions provided by the reviewer. The specific modifications are included in the PDF file. Once again, thank you!
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsExcellent work. The conceptualization of factors affecting the quality of life in rural areas is well done. The methodological design is simple, clear and well developed. The authors are dealing with challenges to rural areas in a substantial portion of the world. I would love to see a comparative study in the USA. Keep up the good work.
Author Response
Thank you for the high evaluation of our work! We are pleased to receive your positive feedback on the conceptualization of factors affecting the quality of life in rural areas and the clarity and development of our methodological design. Regarding your suggestion for a comparative study with the United States, we believe this is a very valuable direction. In future research, we will consider incorporating cross-national comparative analysis to further expand the scope of our study. Once again, thank you for your valuable comments, and we will continue to strive to maintain the quality of our research.
Reviewer 4 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThis is an interesting and meaningful paper. Based on the micro-survey data of 3 provinces, the author evaluated the Rural Human Settlement Development Quality and analyzed its influencing factors. In order to better improve the quality of the paper, several suggestions for reference:
(1) It is suggested to add a marginal contribution sentence in the abstract, that is, where is the core marginal contribution of this study.
(2) In the introduction part, it is suggested to summarize the core marginal contribution of this research, and the current innovation points are relatively scattered.
(3) It is more reasonable to refer to some references for the dimension and measurement of variables.
(4) What is the core theoretical analysis framework of this study? It is suggested to supplement and improve it in the research design part.
(5) The study lacks an in-depth discussion section, which the authors suggest to add. In the discussion part, I will mainly talk about three core points, one is the marginal contribution of this study, the other is the similarities and differences between this study and similar studies, analyze the reasons for the differences, and the third is to point out the shortcomings of this study and the direction of further research in the future.
Author Response
Thank you very much for the valuable suggestions provided by the reviewer. The specific modifications are included in the PDF file. Once again, thank you!
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsIt is clear that the authors have done a solid job of improving the article and trying to take into account the comments made in my review. However, I still do not see a clear formulation in the abstract and in the introduction: «The purpose of this article was... The main tasks performed during the research to achieve the stated purpose were:..». And I don't understand why the authors don't want to specify this. The article would only benefit from this.
It is also not clear why, instead of providing an explanation for the question in my review, the authors four times insert the abstract into their answer („Reply to Reviewers2”).
Author Response
Thank you very much for your valuable comments. Please refer to the PDF file for detailed responses. Thanks again!
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
