Review Reports

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript presents an application of the social network metrics to the global network of tourism with the aim to detect the influence of the network structure on the tourism industry.

The major drawback of this approach is related to the fact that in the linear model used to estimate the impact of centrality measures on ITA_ijt (Formula 2) there is an issue of multicollinearity among control variables that the authors do not account properly. Indeed, centrality measures are well known to be correlated. So, a different methodological approach should be implemented, e.g., accounting for each control variable in distinct specifications or through instrumental variables approaches.

Some other minor issues:

 

·   Line 333: For the sake of completeness, are the distance d_ij taken from an official database? How they are computed.

·   Figure 1: In the caption, please specify that L stands for links and N for nodes.

·   Please check some typos along with the paper.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

This study aims to explain tourism development in a network view and help to organize international tourism effectively. The paper utilizes complex network theory to understand the global tourism network changes and detect the global network structure effects on international tourism industrial performance. The work is within the scope of the journal, however, redaction and structure should be improved as indicated below, especially the methods should be clearer; the author is recommended to identify and practice sophisticated objectives for a journal publication. The author must justify the following points:

Comment 1: The author is using many abbreviations. Hence it is suggested to include a nomenclature at the beginning of the article.

Comment 2: I would suggest adding a Figure at the beginning of Section 3 to explain the steps of the proposed method for this study. Such a Figure could make a better understanding of the applied methods to conduct or build up such analysis. 

Comment 3: The proposed approach in the Materials and Methods section is not outlined with the necessary vigor. The author needs to include sufficient methodological details in the paper and elaborate on the produced results from the proposed methods. Table 1 must be described better to justify the measurements of network structures and international tourism performance. The buildup of the hypothesis is very confused. Please justify the selection of such hypothesis.  

Comment 4: Please explain how Tables 2 to 5 were built up?

Comment 5: The global international tourists flow from 1995 to 2019 presented in Figure 4 was made by the author? Which program/software did the author use to simulate such a Figure? The same issue applies to Figures 5 and 6.

Comment 6: Organization of the manuscript must be revised. Discussion of results comes before conclusion. At the Discussion level, the author needs to include a clear and concise analysis of all results presented. It might be helpful to use more figures to present the results.

Comment 7: Some minor issues to be answered as follows:

·         The author is using (we) too much. Please consider that this is a scientific journal publication, where you need to avoid some phrases like (we, our, ….). Instead, you can use (this work, this study, this analysis….).

·         Proofreading by a native English speaker should be conducted to improve clarity and organization quality. 

·         Do not start with the title and subtitle without a text in between.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Dear authors, please see my attached corrections. Add these comments and questions/suggestions in order to improve your work.

All the best.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Response to Reviewer 3 Comments

 

Point 1: Line 15 in the abstract “222 regions”, which regions? Line 84 “again, which are these regions? ”.

Response 1:Thanks for the reviewer’s question. The 222 regions are from the statistics of the UNWTO database, and we also add the details in Sec 3.1 as “All the data of 222 listed regions in the UNWTO database from 1995 to 2019”.

 

Point 2: Line 32 “add citations”, line 35-36 “add references” and line 35 “more citations”.

Response 2: Thanks for your suggestion, we add more references to help with background description, which include:

(1) Martens P, Rotmans J. Transitions in a globalizing world. Future, 2005. 37, 10: 1133-1144.

(2) Middleton, Victor TC, and Jackie R. Clarke. Marketing in travel and tourism. 2012: Routledge.

(3) Tovmasyan G. Tourism development trends in the world. Euro J Econ Stud, 2016. 3: 429-434.

 

Point 3: Line 163 “very nice section”, and line 166 “in this study, do you add the effects of covid 19?? 2020-2022?”

Response 3: Thanks very much for your encouragement and your kind recommendation. As we hardly collect the data during 2020-2022, and the statistics of UNWTO have not shown the details, thus we didn't take the covid-19 period into our consideration.

 

Point 4: Line 237 “here tqo things, clarify the regions and second indicate that you are not including covid years data and the reasons”.

Response 4: In terms of the data for 2020-2022, the data is not available, thus we didn't analyze it. And we also add this statement as" Owing to the data is not available in this database, thus this paper did not consider the change during covid-19 period" in the revised paper. In terms of the regions, we explained in the manuscript as “All the data of 222 listed regions in the UNWTO database from 1995 to 2019”.

 

Point 5: Figure 4, 5, and 6 “improve maps resolution”.

Response 5: Thanks, we output these figures again, and can give the vector diagram as the editor need.

 

Point 6: Line 494 “Missing sections in Discussion and Conclusions:

1. Your study needs to discuss first the models uncertainties, comparing with other studies dealing with the topic.
2. How other studies indicate similar or dissimilar results
3. Indicate limitations of your model and how future studies can improve them
4. A Conclusions separated section is compulsory.”

Response 6: Thanks for your guide. We have revised our manuscript as you said. But the sizes of the discussion and conclusion are too long, thus we didn't put in the response. You can find it in our revised manuscript.

 

For more details please see the attachment

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors have addressed my comments positively. I thank them for their responses to my criticisms and suggestions.

Reviewer 2 Report

The work has improved and the author answered all my previous comments