Balancing Landscape and Purification in Urban Aquatic Horticulture: Selection Strategies Based on Public Perception

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear authors, this is undoubtedly a very interesting study, as it evaluates important aspects such as the aesthetic perception of urban waterscapes and visual preferences. However, the authors should make some adjustments:
Keywords should not exceed five.
In the introduction, there is a strong emphasis on the importance of ecological purification. The title also mentions purification in horticulture, but there are no findings in the results or discussion.
Regarding the methodology, the authors should consider the research location, climatic characteristics, and soil characteristics, which are necessary.
Seven questions were asked in total. According to expert methodologists, the minimum required is 12 questions.
Regarding the questionnaire, what were the criteria for validating the questions? Was it subject to expert judgment?
The results indicate a participation of 320 participants. What were the sample selection criteria? While it is stated that the questions were asked virtually and that many responses were filtered, this is not indicated in the sample selection methodology.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

I am not qualified to make that comment.

Author Response

Thank you for your comments, which helped us a lot, and we have further improved the manuscript, which is attached.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors Dear Authors, Thank you for your submission. I think your manuscript is relevant to the journal and potentially of interest to its readership. However, there are some improvements needed before further considering it for publication. Please, below you may find my remarks/ suggestions:   1. Figure 1 must be supported with a new study area map. This can be a new figure which shows where Fuzhou is located within China, and a second map showing the city map with labelled locations points of each of 16 Parks shown in figure 1. 2. Images in Figures 2 and 3 must be larger. It is too difficult to see the difference between versions. 3. Please all multi-part figures must have a dedicated caption that explain each sub-figure in detail. E.g. Figure (a), (b)....  4. Figure 5 can be split into separate figures, as it consists of 6 sub-figures of very different character. 5. Some acronyms have been more than once introduced ( Line 479 and 510). This can often happen when you use generative AI. Please make sure you introduce acronyms only once at first time that you use. 6. Limitations of the study must also be explained why you could not solve before the study?  7. My most important concern is related with the virtual environments. Why have you decided to evaluate virtually generated scenes, while you may have shown real views from parks (Figure 1)? This could lead to an excellent comparative study between real vs virtual landscape evaluation.  Looking forward to the revised version of your manuscript. Kind Regards. Reviewer

Author Response

Thank you for your comments, which have been very helpful. We have carefully responded to all comments from both reviewers and further improved the manuscript, as detailed in the Appendix.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf