在 if 语句中使用 return 时有什么作用？

在下面的代码中，if 语句中的返回值有什么作用？

public void startElement(String namespaceURI, String localName,String qName, 
                                         Attributes atts) throws SAXException
{
    depth++;
    if (localName.equals("channel"))
    {
        currentstate = 0;
        return;
    }
    if (localName.equals("image"))
    {
        // record our feed data - you temporarily stored it in the item :)
        _feed.setTitle(_item.getTitle());
        _feed.setPubDate(_item.getPubDate());
    }
    if (localName.equals("item"))
    {
        // create a new item
        _item = new RSSItem();
        return;
    }
    if (localName.equals("title"))
    {
        currentstate = RSS_TITLE;
        return;
    }
    if (localName.equals("description"))
    {
        currentstate = RSS_DESCRIPTION;
        return;
    }
    if (localName.equals("link"))
    {
        currentstate = RSS_LINK;
        return;
    }
    if (localName.equals("category"))
    {
        currentstate = RSS_CATEGORY;
        return;
    }
    if (localName.equals("pubDate"))
    {
        currentstate = RSS_PUBDATE;
        return;
    }
    // if you don't explicitly handle the element, make sure you don't wind 
           // up erroneously storing a newline or other bogus data into one of our 
           // existing elements
    currentstate = 0;
}

它是将我们从 if 语句中带出并继续执行下一个语句，还是将我们从方法 startElement 中带出？