Regarding the “step effect” issue in the geochemical data of the Baiyinchagan Dongshan-Maodeng area, this study aims to compare the leveling effects of the contrast return method and the boundary leveling method, and to evaluate the applicability of these methods in eliminating deviations between maps and improving data quality. The geochemical data of six sheets in the study area were preprocessed using compositional data transformation. The preprocessed data were then leveling processed using both the mean-based and median-based contrast return methods, as well as the boundary leveling method. The effectivenesses of these methods in eliminating step effect and improving data continuity were then compared. The results show that the step effect cannot be effectively eliminated by using both the mean-based and median-based contrast return methods, especially for data of areas with relatively significant geological background differences. In contrast, the step effects of geochemical data can be effectively eliminated using the boundary leveling method for processing, particularly for data of areas with consistent geological backgrounds, with the best performance of large-scale maps. The study confirms that the boundary leveling method is more effective than the contrast return method for addressing the step effect of geochemical data. This research provides an effective leveling approach for processing geochemical data of complex regions.
TANG et al. (Thu,) studied this question.