Peer Review History

Original SubmissionJanuary 6, 2022
Decision Letter - Walid Kamal Abdelbasset, Editor

PONE-D-21-39854Attention and Social Communication Skills of Very Preterm Infants after Training Attention Control:  Findings from a Feasibility StudyPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Perra,

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.

==============================

Please submit your revised manuscript by Mar 24 2022 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

  • A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
  • A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
  • An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Walid Kamal Abdelbasset, Ph.D.

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Journal Requirements:

When submitting your revision, we need you to address these additional requirements.

1. Please ensure that your manuscript meets PLOS ONE's style requirements, including those for file naming. The PLOS ONE style templates can be found at 

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=wjVg/PLOSOne_formatting_sample_main_body.pdf and 

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=ba62/PLOSOne_formatting_sample_title_authors_affiliations.pdf.

2. Thank you for stating the following in the Acknowledgments Section of your manuscript: 

[We are very grateful to all the parents and their children who gave their time to take part in this study. Dr Nita Saxeena (HSC South-East Trust) and Dr Sanjeev Bali (HSC North Trust) gave a significant and generous contribution to the recruitment of participants in the study. Dr Nicola Doherty (HSC Western Trust) and Danielle Barnes contributed with insights and feedback during Steering Group meetings. We also wish to thank the TinyLife workers that enthusiastically helped with recruitment and the running of the study.  We thank the Health and Social Care Research and Development Division, Public Health Agency, for the financial support received. We are particularly grateful to Dr Julie McCarroll (PHA) for her advice and guidance. We thank Aaron Patterson for his contribution to data collection, and Dr Ahmet Butun for his contribution to data coding.]

We note that you have provided funding information that is not currently declared in your Funding Statement. However, funding information should not appear in the Acknowledgments section or other areas of your manuscript. We will only publish funding information present in the Funding Statement section of the online submission form. 

Please remove any funding-related text from the manuscript and let us know how you would like to update your Funding Statement. Currently, your Funding Statement reads as follows: 

[Financial Disclosure Statement: this study was funded by a public health agency (PHA), health and social care (HSC)  research and development division (https://research.hscni.net/) enabling research award to Dr O Perra (principal investigator) and co-investigators Prof F Alderdice, Dr S Wass, Dr K Papageorgiou, Mrs A Mcnulty, reference: STL/5274/16. 

The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.]

Please include your amended statements within your cover letter; we will change the online submission form on your behalf.

3. We note that you have stated that you will provide repository information for your data at acceptance. Should your manuscript be accepted for publication, we will hold it until you provide the relevant accession numbers or DOIs necessary to access your data. If you wish to make changes to your Data Availability statement, please describe these changes in your cover letter and we will update your Data Availability statement to reflect the information you provide.

4. Your ethics statement should only appear in the Methods section of your manuscript. If your ethics statement is written in any section besides the Methods, please move it to the Methods section and delete it from any other section. Please ensure that your ethics statement is included in your manuscript, as the ethics statement entered into the online submission form will not be published alongside your manuscript. 

5. We note that Section 3 of Supplementary Material includes an image of a participant in the study. 

As per the PLOS ONE policy (http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-human-subjects-research) on papers that include identifying, or potentially identifying, information, the individual(s) or parent(s)/guardian(s) must be informed of the terms of the PLOS open-access (CC-BY) license and provide specific permission for publication of these details under the terms of this license. Please download the Consent Form for Publication in a PLOS Journal (http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/file?id=8ce6/plos-consent-form-english.pdf). The signed consent form should not be submitted with the manuscript, but should be securely filed in the individual's case notes. Please amend the methods section and ethics statement of the manuscript to explicitly state that the patient/participant has provided consent for publication: “The individual in this manuscript has given written informed consent (as outlined in PLOS consent form) to publish these case details”. 

If you are unable to obtain consent from the subject of the photograph, you will need to remove the figure and any other textual identifying information or case descriptions for this individual.

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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

Reviewer #3: Yes

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: I Don't Know

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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: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

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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

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

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: Review comments on Manuscript Number: (PONE-D-21-39854) entitled '' Attention and Social Communication Skills of Very Preterm Infants after Training Attention Control: Findings from a Feasibility Study''.

I believe this is potentially an interesting and useful research. Overall, this study provides a novel approach. However, the following concerns will need to be addressed.

Title:

Well structured

Abstract

- It is highly recommended to write the abstract in more structured way (background, methods, results, conclusion)

- It is recommended to write keywords (5 to 7 keywords).

Background (the Introduction)

- Well structured.

Methods

- Satisfactory

Statistical analysis

- Satisfactory

Discussion

- Satisfactory

- The limitations should be clarified in a separate section at the end of discussion.

References

- Some references need to be updated

Reviewer #2: The paper submitted by the authors is interesting and well-written. The statistical analysis is well-done and the results are illustrated in a good way. Therefore, the paper can be accepted in its current form.

Reviewer #3: The manuscripts looks to be good but have some feedbacks for minor correction:

1. in short title: Better not use the abbreviation VP.

2. Usually keywords are <6.

3. Bayesian analysis is more explained in introduction which need to be in method section.

4. Sample size is very small to generalize the study findings.

5. Will you clarify the intervention received by control group?

6. It would be good to start the 1st paragraph of the discussion with aim and hypothesis .

7. In line 302 to 307, 322 it would be compare and contras the findings with other study.

8. Though the participants were of corrected age of <12 months, what other criteria were there for inclusion? like delay developmental milestones or normal hand function like gripping .....

**********

6. 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 #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: No

[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

Attachments
Attachment
Submitted filename: comments.doc
Revision 1

Reviewer #1: I believe this is potentially an interesting and useful research. Overall, this study provides a novel approach. However, the following concerns will need to be addressed. Title: Well structured Abstract - It is highly recommended to write the abstract in more structured way (background, methods, results, conclusion)

Answer: We thank the reviewer for the positive feedback and the comments. We have revised the Abstract (Manuscript Page 2) as suggested.

- It is recommended to write keywords (5 to 7 keywords).

Answer: We have provided a list of keywords after the Abstract (see Manuscript, Page 3).

Background (the Introduction) - Well structured. Methods - Satisfactory Statistical analysis - Satisfactory Discussion - Satisfactory - The limitations should be clarified in a separate section at the end of discussion.

Answer: We have clearly identified the section on limitations providing a sub-title and moving this at the end of the Discussion, as suggested (Manuscript, Page 26).

References - Some references need to be updated

Answer: We updated these. In addition, we have provided references to recent key papers such as: Kaul et al. 2021, DOI: 10.1038/s41390-021-01895-8; Wheelock et al. 2021, DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhaa303; Eves et al., 2021, DOI: 10.1097/DBP.0000000000000806.

Reviewer #2 Reviewer #2: The paper submitted by the authors is interesting and well-written. The statistical analysis is well-done and the results are illustrated in a good way. Therefore, the paper can be accepted in its current form.

Answer: We thank the reviewer for the praise received and their time in reviewing our manuscript.

Reviewer #3 The manuscripts looks to be good but have some feedbacks for minor correction: 1. in short title: Better not use the abbreviation VP.

Answer: We thank the reviewer for the positive feedback. We have accepted this suggestion and corrected the short title. 2. Usually keywords are <6.

Answer: We have provided a list of keywords after the Abstract (Manuscript, Page 3). 3. Bayesian analysis is more explained in introduction which need to be in method section.

Answer: We have thought carefully about this comment. We have however come to the conclusion that a presentation of the key principle underlying Bayesian approaches and how these differ from more traditional approaches is necessary because: (a) The manuscript aims to make a case for the former approaches being used more widely, particularly in exploratory and small-sample analyses; (b) Bayesian approaches are still not widely recognised across disciplines. We thus believe that a relatively short presentation (2 paragraphs) of Bayesian approaches in the Introduction contributes to clarity and dissemination of the paper among a wider audience. 4. Sample size is very small to generalize the study findings.

Answer: We have further emphasised and highlighted this point in the “Limitations” section in the Discussion (Page 26) 5. Will you clarify the intervention received by control group?

Answer: We have restructured the “Interventions” section in the Methods (Page 9 and 10) to increase clarity and provide more details about the control procedure. 6. It would be good to start the 1st paragraph of the discussion with aim and hypothesis .

Answer: Thank you for this comment, which we have taken into account, revising the Discussion accordingly (Page 23). 7. In line 302 to 307, 322 it would be compare and contras the findings with other study.

Answer: We have provided some comparisons to two studies that have used similar procedures in the delivery of the intervention as well as similar measures, in Page 23, as suggested. 8. Though the participants were of corrected age of <12 months, what other criteria were there for inclusion? like delay developmental milestones or normal hand function like gripping .....

Answer: We have highlighted these criteria more clearly in the Methods section (Page 6). In the Limitations section of the Discussion (Page 26) we have also highlighted that the inclusion/exclusion criteria determined the sample was made up of healthy VP infants.

Attachments
Attachment
Submitted filename: Response to Reviewers.docx
Decision Letter - Walid Kamal Abdelbasset, Editor

PONE-D-21-39854R1Attention and Social Communication Skills of Very Preterm Infants after Training Attention Control:  Findings from a Feasibility StudyPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Perra,

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.

==============================

Please submit your revised manuscript by Jun 23 2022 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

  • A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
  • A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
  • An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.
If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Walid Kamal Abdelbasset, Ph.D.

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Journal Requirements:

Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice.

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

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 #1: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #3: All comments have been addressed

**********

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 #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: 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 #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

**********

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 #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: 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 #1: Review comments on Manuscript Number: PONE-D-21-39854R1. Entitled "Attention and Social Communication Skills of Very Preterm Infants after Training Attention Control: Findings from a Feasibility Study"

I would like to thank the authors for their successful work to address the reviewers' comments. The authors have done great efforts to accomplish this work. They fulfilled all comments and made necessary changes throughput the manuscript. I recommend accepting the manuscript its revised form.

Reviewer #3: Now the manuscript looks to be good and I have just a few minor corrections:

1. In referencing, Plosone journal uses the bracket [1] for citation. Just see the articles published in this journal.

2. Line 58 to 68 describes the procedures in the introduction part which need to be in the method section.

3. In the consort flow diagram, check the size of boxes as some words are hidden.

**********

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 #1: No

Reviewer #3: Yes: Bishnu Dutta Acharya

[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

Revision 2

Reviewer #3:

Now the manuscript looks to be good and I have just a few minor corrections:

1. In referencing, Plosone journal uses the bracket [1] for citation. Just see the articles published in this journal.

Answer: Thank you for drawing our attention to this. We have carried out this change throughout the manuscript.

2. Line 58 to 68 describes the procedures in the introduction part which need to be in the method section.

Answer: We have now moved this section to the start of the Methods.

3. In the consort flow diagram, check the size of boxes as some words are hidden.

Answer: We apologise for this mistake, which we have now corrected.

Attachments
Attachment
Submitted filename: Response to Reviewers.docx
Decision Letter - Walid Kamal Abdelbasset, Editor

PONE-D-21-39854R2Attention and Social Communication Skills of Very Preterm Infants after Training Attention Control:  Findings from a Feasibility StudyPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Perra,

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.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Aug 08 2022 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

  • A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the academic editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
  • A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
  • An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.
If you would like to make changes to your financial disclosure, please include your updated statement in your cover letter. Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols. Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Walid Kamal Abdelbasset, Ph.D.

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Journal Requirements:

Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice.

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

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 #3: All comments have been addressed

**********

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 #3: Yes

**********

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

Reviewer #3: 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 #3: Yes

**********

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 #3: 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 #3: Author have addressed the reviewer's comments.

This paper looks already published with the same protocol number and similar title although the statical findings are different.

Please confirm it once. The published paper title is "Very preterm infants engage in an intervention to train their control of attention: results from the feasibility study of the Attention Control Training (ACT) randomised trial".

PMC7952829

The published article is attached with this.

**********

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 #3: Yes: Bishnu Dutta Acharya

**********

[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

Attachments
Attachment
Submitted filename: s40814-021-00809-z.pdf
Revision 3

Reviewer #3 raised concerns regarding the originality of the study, highlighting results from the same study have been published in a previous paper titled “Very preterm infants engage in an intervention to train their control of attention: Results from the feasibility study of the Attention Control Training (ACT) randomised trial”, published in Pilot and Feasibility Studies, Volume 7, 23, p. 66.

We thank the reviewer for these comments, and take the chance to highlight that while the results are from the same study, the previous publication referred to the outcomes of the study that concerned its feasibility, i.e.: recruitment and retention, engagement with the training, acceptability and completion of outcome measures. Conversely, in the manuscript we have submitted to PLOS One, we have focused on the infants’ performance in the outcome measures collected and used a relatively novel approach, Bayesian regression, to estimate the direction and size of training effects.

We appreciate the reviewer’s comments, and to ensure that we emphasise the different content and scope of the two papers, we have carried out the following changes to the manuscript:

1. We have changed the title from “Attention and Social Communication Skills of Very Preterm Infants after Training Attention Control: Findings from a Feasibility Study” to “Attention And Social Communication Skills of Very Preterm Infants after Training Attention Control: Bayesian Analyses of a Feasibility Study”.

2. We have added a sentence in the Abstract (Page 2, Line 37), which now reads:

In a previous study we analysed the data concerning feasibility (e.g. recruitment and retention). In the paper presented here we considered the infants’ performance and used Bayesian regression in order to provide credible treatment estimates considering the data collected.

3. We have added a sentence in the Introduction (Page 5, Line 5), which now reads:

We conducted a study to test the feasibility of delivering the ACT to VP infants [36]: in a previous study [37,38] we presented the main results concerning feasibility (e.g. recruitment and retention): these results indicated that infants engaged in the training and assessments. Conversely, in this manuscript we investigate the direction of treatment effects across a series of infants’ outcomes using Bayesian regression. Bayesian analyses allow to update assumptions about parameters (e.g. differences between two groups) by incorporating new information [39].

4. We have added a sentence in the Discussion (Page 24, Line 12), which now reads:

This is the first study that trained VP infants’ attention control. Previous analyses indicated it is possible to recruit and retain VP infants and engage them in the training [37,38]. Conversely, the analyses of infants’ performance in different tasks presented in this paper are important in providing initial estimates concerning the potential for improving early key cognitive abilities of this at-risk group.

All these changes are meant to highlight that a previous paper has been published that reports the results concerning feasibility of the study and, conversely, the current manuscript concerns the use of Bayesian methods to explore the direction of treatment effects on infants’ abilities, which were not considered as outcomes in the previously published paper.

We hope these changes address the concerns raised by the reviewer, increasing clarity for the readership. We thank the reviewer and the Editor again for the chance to improve our manuscript, and look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely

Dr Oliver Perra

Attachments
Attachment
Submitted filename: Response to Reviewers.docx
Decision Letter - Walid Kamal Abdelbasset, Editor

Attention and Social Communication Skills of Very Preterm Infants after Training Attention Control:  Bayesian analyses of a Feasibility Study

PONE-D-21-39854R3

Dear Dr. Perra,

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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If your institution or institutions have a press office, please notify them about your upcoming paper to help maximize its impact. If they’ll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team as soon as possible -- no later than 48 hours after receiving the formal acceptance. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact onepress@plos.org.

Kind regards,

Walid Kamal Abdelbasset, Ph.D.

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 #3: 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 #3: Yes

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

Reviewer #3: Yes

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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 #3: Yes

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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 #3: Yes

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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 #3: Thank you for addressing the previous comments. The article looks fine and there looks difference from previous publications.

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Reviewer #3: Yes: Bishnu Dutta Acharya

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Formally Accepted
Acceptance Letter - Walid Kamal Abdelbasset, Editor

PONE-D-21-39854R3

Attention and social communication skills of very preterm infants after training attention control: Bayesian analyses of a feasibility study

Dear Dr. Perra:

I'm pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been deemed suitable for publication in PLOS ONE. Congratulations! Your manuscript is now with our production department.

If your institution or institutions have a press office, please let them know about your upcoming paper now to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team within the next 48 hours. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information please contact onepress@plos.org.

If we can help with anything else, please email us at plosone@plos.org.

Thank you for submitting your work to PLOS ONE and supporting open access.

Kind regards,

PLOS ONE Editorial Office Staff

on behalf of

Dr. Walid Kamal Abdelbasset

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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