Indoor Environmental Quality towards Classrooms’ Comforts Level: Case Study at Malaysian Secondary School Building

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The article "Indoor Environmental Quality Towards Classrooms’ Comforts Level in Secondary School Building" is a survey study about the perception of indoor comfort among students in secondary schools in Malaysia. The article must better explain what is the scientific contribution of this survey and what should be the application of the obtained results. Section 3 - methodology must be expanded with more details about the survey approach and the conditions during the survey. Further, the following comments must be addressed:

1. References must be numbered in order of appearance in the text. Check the Instructions for authors. Line 132 uses a different reference style.
2. Line 73: "thermal comfort" is listed twice. Should it be visual comfort?
3. The sentence in line 112 is missing the verb.
4. The quality of Figure 1 must be enhanced, the text is barely readable.
5. What is the contribution of the present research? From sections 1 and 2 it can be understood that classroom thermal comfort is assessed by surveying students. But how does your research compare and advance previous ones?
6. Post occupancy evaluation (POE) is a general approach while the survey method is the principal tool in your research. Rather than extensively describing the POE approach, sections 2 and 3  should give more information about the survey method.
7. Line 160: what do you mean by adequate sample size? You select 382 students from what total number? How was the selection performed? What is the age of the respondents? How many classrooms and secondary school buildings are included in the study? What was the period of the year and outdoor weather conditions during the survey?
8. Table 1: male students represent 201/382=52.6% of the respondents. What is the "N" in table 2 and why it is different from the "N" in table 1?
9. In your opinion, what is the cause for male respondents considering thermal comfort as the only important indicator while female respondents selected all the other indicators except thermal comfort?
10. There is no table 4 in the text.
11. Table 5: improve the formatting, the text and results are hard to read. What is the difference between mean and overall mean?
12. Table 5 shows that thermal comfort and overall comfort achieve low average levels of satisfaction among students. What was the indoor air temperature during the survey? There is no HVAC system in the classrooms, only air fans?

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Thank You.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear Authors, 

the paper is interesting, but in order to be improved some revisions are requested. Major drawbacks are presented below by the following points:

1. Page 1 line 2 to 3: Title should be changed and should add some information because this study was only conducted in Malaysian students.

2. Page 1 line 34, 37, 39, etc: Check citations format throughout the paper. In the text, reference numbers should be placed in square brackets [ ], and placed before the punctuation; for example [1], [1–3] or [1,3]. For embedded citations in the text with pagination, use both parentheses and brackets to indicate the reference number and page numbers; for example [5] (p. 10). or [6] (pp. 101–105). Please consult: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/applsci/instructions#preparation

3. Page 2 line 73: it has been written twice: “… ii) thermal comfort, iii) thermal comfort…”. Please check this.

4. Page 3 line 128: Figure 1 - it is necessary to improve the figure resolution to make it clearer. Please make this.

5. Page 4 line 159: how many were female and male students?

6. Page 5 line 173 to 179: I suggest the authors to move this part of the text to the Research Methodology section.

7. Page 6 line 214: Table 2 - it is unclear how many female students and how many male students. E.g. for cleanliness is stated 151 males, for visual comfort is stated 144 males, for thermal comfort is stated 255 males, etc. This is confusing for the reader. Please check and correct this.

8. Page 7 line 242: Is it table 5 or table 4? Where is table 4? Please check and correct this.

9. Page 8 line 264: Is it table 5 or table 4? It is necessary to rearrange the table to make it clearer to the reader.

10. Page 11 to 13 line 336 to 400: Check citations format references in all references section.

Please consult: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/applsci/instructions#preparation 

References should be described as follows, depending on the type of work:

Journal Articles:

1. Author 1, A.B.; Author 2, C.D. Title of the article. Abbreviated Journal Name Year, Volume, page range.

Books and Book Chapters:

2. Author 1, A.; Author 2, B. Book Title, 3rd ed.; Publisher: Publisher Location, Country, Year; pp. 154–196.
3. Author 1, A.; Author 2, B. Title of the chapter. In Book Title, 2nd ed.; Editor 1, A., Editor 2, B., Eds.; Publisher: Publisher Location, Country, Year; Volume 3, pp. 154–196.

Unpublished work, submitted work, personal communication:

4. Author 1, A.B.; Author 2, C. Title of Unpublished Work. status (unpublished; manuscript in preparation).
5. Author 1, A.B.; Author 2, C. Title of Unpublished Work. Abbreviated Journal Name stage of publication (under review; accepted; in press).
6. Author 1, A.B. (University, City, State, Country); Author 2, C. (Institute, City, State, Country). Personal communication, Year.

Conference Proceedings:

7. Author 1, A.B.; Author 2, C.D.; Author 3, E.F. Title of Presentation. In Title of the Collected Work (if available), Proceedings of the Name of the Conference, Location of Conference, Country, Date of Conference; Editor 1, Editor 2, Eds. (if available); Publisher: City, Country, Year (if available); Abstract Number (optional), Pagination (optional).

Thesis:
8. Author 1, A.B. Title of Thesis. Level of Thesis, Degree-Granting University, Location of University, Date of Completion.

Websites:

9. Title of Site. Available online: URL (accessed on Day Month Year).
   Unlike published works, websites may change over time or disappear, so we encourage you create an archive of the cited website using a service such as WebCite.

Archived websites should be cited using the link provided as follows:
10. Title of Site. URL (archived on Day Month Year).

Comments for author File: Comments.docx

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Thank You. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Providing a comfortable learning experience is very important, especially in hot climates. The presented research results to some extent bring closer the problem of comfort assessment. Below are comments and suggestions:

1. Literature numbering is not written as recommended.
2. Line 42, write what are the requirements for lighting and ventilation. Please refer to the standard requirements.
3. Lines 53, 67, 77, starting the sentence with square brackets is not correct.
4. In the Introduction, please also write two or three sentences regarding dustiness - is it measured? 5. In section 2.1, it should be written down the reasons for the discrepancy over the period (4-24 months) of Post Occupancy Evaluation. A few examples should be referred to.
5. Figure 1 has poor resolution and should be redrawn.
6. Figure 2, the text is stretched with a different font, please use the same font throughout the text. 8. Line 141, sentence "… building occupants are satisfied [20] Comfortable classroom conditions…." should be corrected.
7. Line 160, correct the wording “… ..Krejcie & Morgan….”.
8. Line 164, expand the abbreviation: SPSS.
9. In the third Chapter, a flowchart should be added to the research methodology.
10. Line 177 "... .A Likert scale ..." should be referenced.
11. Tables 1, 2, 3, 5, write up to the letter N.
12. Table 5 should have a different numbering, rather 4.
13. In the fourth Chapter, for large amounts of data, there is no statistical study. Charts with analysis of variance or basic statistical plots, such as standard deviation, standard error, should be added.
14. In the Conclusion, it should be reported on the results and comparisons of the test results presented in Table 4.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Thank You. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors have made improvements following the first round of revisions. Still, the following point must be addressed:

1. Check the results in table 2. For example the mean rating for furniture is correct: (25×1+32×2+85×3+133×4+107×5)/382 = 3.6937 - correct. However, for lighting: (46×1+62×2+20×3+171×4+83×5)/382 = 3.4791 but in Table 2 the result is 3.7094! The ratings for Ventilation and Space also seem to contain errors. Also, check the ratings given in Table 3.
2. The average rating for thermal comfort is a low 2.1662. I suggest that you give a strong statement in the conclusion about how to increase the thermal comfort rating: ceiling fans only or air-conditioning unit (regardless of the schools' electricity bills). In my opinion, air fans can only improve the air temperature sensation, however at high air temperatures and humidities, air fans cannot meet thermal comfort requirements and AC units should be used instead. Please give a table reporting average monthly air temperature and humidities at the location of the survey.
3. Table 6: the method "Additional unit of mechanical ventilation" does it include air-conditioning or not? In line 404 you say that this method includes both ceiling fans and AC units? I do not understand this line: the Ministry of Education and the Public Works Department must approve the use of AC units in schools? This means that the schools cannot decide on their own whether to use or not AC units? The schools have no extra funds to cover the expenses of AC units maitenance and electricity bills? In your opinion, the local community and the students' families could be asked to pay for the AC units? 

Author Response

Please see the attachment. 

Thank You. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear Authors,

the work has been much improved, but there are still significant shortcomings that need to be addressed. The following points must be addressed:

1. Check the results in table 2. The ratings seem to contain errors.
2. Check the results in table 3. The ratings seem to contain errors.
3. In line 300 the beginning of the sentence is missing. Please correct the mistake.
4. 3. I suggest that you give a strong statement in the conclusion about how to increase the thermal comfort rating.
5. Air fans can only improve the air temperature sensation, however at high air temperatures and humidity’s, air fans cannot meet thermal comfort requirements and AC units should be used instead. Please clarify this.
6. Create and add a table that reports the average monthly air temperature and humidity at the survey site.

Comments for author File: Comments.docx

Author Response

Please see the attachment. 

Thank You. 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

The article has been well improved.

Author Response

Thank you for the responses on this manuscript improvement. The reviewer 3 is satisfied with the correction done. However, the authors still will proceed for the final round of proofreading and editing after the final version of the manuscript writing. Really appreciated on the contribution of this manuscript reviewing.

Thank You.  

Round 3

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors have addressed all my comment and made all the necessary improvements in the manuscript. I have no further suggestions.

Reviewer 2 Report

The article has been well improved.