PONE-D-21-16452

Stuck in a lockdown: dreams, bad dreams, nightmares, and their relationship to stress, depression and anxiety during the COVID-19 pandemic.

PLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Solomonova,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

Although reviewers recommend publication, reviewer 2 suggests some minor revisions to your paper that will improve it further. 

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We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Serena Scarpelli

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

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4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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5. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: This is a very well structured and written manuscript on a theme that has already drawn a considerable research attention. The results echo previous studies for the key questions. In this sense, the contribution of this study to the previous studies is being confirmative rather than being entirely novel. Yet, the associations between mental health and nighmares/bad dreams were very weak.

The retrospective estimate of dreaming pre-pandemicly is questionnable though as a comparison variable - therefore the result of no increase of bad dreaming is not very solid.

My impression of the manuscript then is that it is very well constructed - methods, results. discussion and limitations - all are well in place. But the scientifiv contribution of this study is not such strong - negative or null findings may also depend on the context where the survey was conducted, including retrospective evaluations that are not very reliable.

Reviewer #2: The paper is well written. The introduction points to a very recent literature review in an organized sequence, linking with previous literature on dream research.

The methodology is appropriate for the hypothesis and research question and well explained. Results with figures and tables are well described, in a logical sequence of analysis, with rigorous statistics and adequately corrected by multiple comparisons.

At the discussion session, during the discussion of multilinear models, the interpretation suggests causality (“These results indicate a potential role that bad dreams and nightmares may play in amplifying the experience of stress, depression, and anxiety”). Still, the method doesn’t support this conclusion, as it models an association in a single time point. Thus, for example, the association between antidepressants and levels of depression, anxiety, and stress is expected and makes sense (those that in this single time point were expressing higher levels of symptoms were also already in treatment). Still, we cannot say that antidepressants generate higher levels of stress, depression, and anxiety.

The association with mental suffering and antidepressants also flagged one caution related to the effects of antidepressants (or even mental illness diagnosis) into a dream experience. It would be interesting to repeat the analysis on two groups: 1. a group without mental illness diagnosis and no use of psychiatric medication; and 2. a group under psychiatric treatment. Maybe the associations with dreams and psychopathology may reveal different associations for those already under treatment and those that were not.

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

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Stuck in a lockdown: dreams, bad dreams, nightmares, and their relationship to stress, depression and anxiety during the COVID-19 pandemic.

PONE-D-21-16452R1

Dear Dr. Solomonova,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

Within one week, you’ll receive an e-mail detailing the required amendments. When these have been addressed, you’ll receive a formal acceptance letter and your manuscript will be scheduled for publication.

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Kind regards,

Serena Scarpelli

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed

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2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #2: No

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5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #2: (No Response)

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7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #2: No