Review Reports

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors,

Thank you for the opportunity to read your research. Below are points to consider. 

Lines 52 - 55 and lines 63 - There is unnecessary use of elongated dashes. Consider replacing with commas.

Line 70 - no need to include "Study management". 

Lines 70-77 - Please note if the research assistants had training or experience using the tools and systems for this specific research study.  Also note if they were blinded to the groups that the participants were in when conducting the testing for the control and intervention group.

Lines 80 - 87 - collapse the very short paragraphs (one or two sentences) into broader paragraphs.

Line 90- It appears that "Study Subjects" should be a subheading. Please update.

Lines 90-94 - Was a power test conducted to determine the minimum number of participants for the study? If so, provide this information. 

Lines 124 -143 - Do not use dot points for the pre and post test measures. For each of the tests provide more information about the validity and reliability of each individual test and cite supporting references.

Lines 219 - 291 - (Discussion section) This section is generally well structured and grounded in relevant literature; however, several aspects require refinement to strengthen scientific rigor and clarity. Interpretations of physiological “stability” and underlying mechanisms (e.g., vagal modulation, baroreflex involvement) should be more precisely defined and framed as inferred rather than directly demonstrated, as these processes were not measured. Causal language should be softened, given the short intervention duration and modest sample size. The section on kata performance requires more explicit linkage between autonomic changes, sensorimotor improvements, and judged technical outcomes. 

Lines 293 - 306 (Limitations section) - Use paragraphs rather than point form.

Kindest regards

 

 

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

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General comments

The manuscript requires moderate revisions aimed at improving methodological clarity, statistical reporting, and interpretative precision. The comments below specify concrete and operational changes that should be implemented. Please see the minor revision in the specific comments. Please consider the minor revision in the attachment.

 

Specific comments

Title

- Please indicate explicitly that the intervention duration was one week.

- Please clarify whether the population includes multiple martial arts disciplines in the title or subtitle.

 

Abstract

- Please add effect size values for all key outcomes (e.g., r for nonparametric tests).

- Please explicitly report the primary outcome variable.

- Please clarify that nonparametric statistics were used due to distributional assumptions.

 

Introduction

- Please reduce repetition across paragraphs describing HRV biofeedback mechanisms.

- Please clarify whether the study is primarily mechanistic or performance-oriented.

- Please align the final paragraph of the Introduction more explicitly with the stated outcomes (autonomic, sensorimotor, and performance).

 

2. Materials and Methods

2.1 Study Management

- Please specify the exact preseason phase (weeks/months) during which data were collected.

• Please clarify whether participants maintained identical training loads during the intervention week.
•  

2.2 Participants

- Please add explicit exclusion criteria (e.g., prior HRV-BFB exposure, breathing disorders).

- Please report whether a sample size or power justification was performed.

- Please clarify whether sex and sport discipline were balanced across groups and whether this was statistically verified.

 

2.3 Experimental Design

- Please clarify whether randomisation was stratified by sport discipline.

- Please specify whether assessors of sensorimotor tests and kata judges were blinded to group allocation.

 

2.4 Sensorimotor and Physiological Assessments

- Please report test–retest reliability or typical error for:

- reaction time tasks,

- tremorometry task,

- grip-force differentiation task,

- HRV and respiratory measurements derived from PPG.

- Please justify the use of PPG-derived HRV instead of ECG-based measures.

- Please specify the duration and conditions of baseline HRV recordings.

 

2.5 HRV Biofeedback Intervention

- Please justify the choice of five sessions and total exposure time.

- Please clarify whether adherence to at-home breathing practice was monitored.

- Please specify whether resonance frequency was reassessed across sessions.

- Improve figure 1 quality; also add number of participants in each branch.

 

2.6 Statistical Analysis

- Please explicitly define the unit of analysis (participant-level).

- Please report exact p-values instead of thresholds.

- Please add effect size estimates for all comparisons.

- Please clarify how multiple outcomes were handled analytically.

 

Results

- Please add a short synthesis paragraph summarising the main between-group effects.

- Please ensure consistent terminology when referring to trend-level results.

- Please clarify whether judges’ scores were averaged across judges prior to analysis.

 

Discussion

- Please clearly separate interpretation of autonomic, sensorimotor, and performance outcomes.

- Please avoid causal language when discussing short-term associations.

- Please clarify whether improvements in reaction time could reflect learning effects.

- Please reduce speculative mechanistic explanations not directly supported by measured variables.

 

Limitations

- Please explicitly acknowledge the short intervention duration as a key limitation.

- Please acknowledge the heterogeneity of martial arts disciplines.

- Please clarify limitations associated with PPG-based HRV assessment.

 

Conclusions

- Please avoid extrapolating findings to long-term performance adaptation.

- Please focus conclusions on short-term feasibility and observed associations.

- Please ensure all conclusions are directly supported by the reported results.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors,

Well done on making all the improvements. Please attend to Table 1 p-values. Some of the p-values use a comma rather than a decimal point.

Kindest regards

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf