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Response to Reviewers 2

The purpose of the author's response is to convince the editor that this study is credible and that the author is confident. Answers can also be seen as an opportunity to show your ability as a researcher. The following response describes how and how to disagree with a comment from a reader.

RESPONSE TO REVIEWER 2:

We wish to express our appreciation to the Reviewer for his or her insightful comments, which have helped us significantly improve the paper.

Comment 1:Did consumption vary across the two study cohorts? If so, you may want to present Table 1 characteristics for each cohort separately; if not, you may want to include a statement saying consumption, and other characteristics, were similar for the two cohorts.

Response: We appreciate the Reviewer’s comment. However, given that the difference in consumption between Cohort I and Cohort II was not large, we have accordingly retained the original Table 1.

Comment 2: Under "Statistical Analysis", you state that the dietary questionnaires were somewhat different across the two cohorts. I believe this statement is focused on covariates, not including consumption, but if it is also applies to consumption, you should mention this when you first discuss exposure assessment.

Response: As the Reviewer noted, our original expression here tended to be confusing.

Accordingly, we have changed the following text from (p. 9, line 18- p. 10, line 2):

“The questionnaires used in Cohort I and Cohort II differed slightly with respect to food items, method of expression and frequency categories.”

to

“The questionnaires used in Cohort I and Cohort II differed slightly with respect to food items, method of expression and frequency categories (excluding coffee and miso soup consumption).”

8. Page 9: Under "Statistical Analysis", please specify how body mass index was included in the model (continuous variable? categories?) to be consistent with the other covariates.

In accordance with the Reviewer's comment, we have changed the following text from (p. 10, line 10):

“body mass index”

to

body mass index (continuous)

10. Page 14: You state that few studies have examined the association between consumption and prostate cancer risk by stage, but you don't present results by stage from other studies. (There was one study where you state that prostate cancer was typically diagnosed at an advanced stage in China, but no results were presented specifically by stage.) Please add details from previous studies on results by stage.

We regret that our expression of this information was incorrect. In fact, no previous papers have reported the association between consumption and prostate cancer in regard to cancer stage.

Although two studies have examined the association between consumption and prostate cancer risk according to stage, reference 10 is a paper from China, where prostate cancer is typically diagnosed at an advanced stage, and the authors did not classify cases by local stage. Reference 14 shows results classified by all and aggressive tumors, but this paper researched the association between general consumption and prostate cancer.

Therefore, we have changed the following text from (p. 15, line 10-11):

“However, few studies have examined the association between consumption and prostate cancer risk with regard to cancer stage.”

to

“However, no studies have examined the association between consumption and prostate cancer risk with regard to cancer stage.”

Thank you again for your comments on our paper. I trust that the revised manuscript is suitable for publication.

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