PONE-D-23-15710“Association between work stress and burnout among active correctional officers in Puerto Rico: a cross-sectional study”PLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Diaz-Algorri,

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 Dec 09 2023 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.

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We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Academic Editor Comments:

We appreciate the manuscript you submitted. After a thorough evaluation by our esteemed reviewers, we are delighted to inform you that your manuscript requires revisions.

The reviewers found your work to be promising, and with the suggested revisions, we believe it will significantly enhance the overall quality and impact of the publication.

Information regarding BURNOUT could be found in article: Who Cares What the Doctor Feels: The Responsibility of Health Politics for Burnout in the Pandemic

link : https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9032/9/11/1550

Kindly review and evaluate the requested work to determine whether they are relevant and should be cited.

Once you have completed the revisions, please submit the revised version of your manuscript through our online submission system. Include both a clean version and a tracked changes version to aid our review process.

We eagerly anticipate the enhanced version of your manuscript and your continued collaboration with our journal.

Should you have any questions or require any clarification during the revision process, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Sincerely,

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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: 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: No

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: No

Reviewer #3: 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: "Association between work stress and burnout among active correctional officers in Puerto Rico: a cross-sectional study" aims to investigate the association between work stress and burnout among active correctional officers in Puerto Rico. The study is important as it sheds light on the prevalence of burnout among correctional officers and the factors that contribute to it. Overall, the study is important as it contributes to the understanding of burnout among correctional officers and can inform the development of interventions to improve their well-being.

That being said, the study used a convenience sample, which may introduce bias and limit the generalizability of the findings. It would have been preferable to use a random sampling method to ensure a more representative sample of the population of correctional officers in Puerto Rico. Furthermore, the ratio of unexposed (COs not exposed to work stress) to exposed (COs exposed to stress) was calculated based on data obtained from the literature review. While this approach can provide some insights, it may not accurately reflect the specific context of Puerto Rico and the population of correctional officers being studied. It would have been more ideal to collect data directly from the study participants to determine the ratio of unexposed to exposed.

The inclusion/exclusion criterion of the study is that they may limit the generalizability of the findings. The criteria included being active in the Alianza Correccional Unida (ACU), having served as a correctional officer for more than one year, being over 21 years old, and wanting to be part of the study and signing the consent form. While these criteria may have been necessary for the specific population being studied, they may not accurately reflect the broader population of correctional officers in Puerto Rico or other regions. For example, the criteria of being a member of the ACU may exclude correctional officers who are not part of the union, and the requirement of having served for more than one year may exclude newer officers who may have different experiences with work stress and burnout. Additionally, the criteria of wanting to be part of the study and signing the consent form may introduce self-selection bias, as those who are more interested in the topic may be more likely to participate.

The mentioned questionnaire administration is the lack of consideration for cultural and linguistic diversity. The study mentions that the questionnaires were administered in Spanish, which suggests that participants were required to have proficiency in the Spanish language. This language restriction may unintentionally exclude individuals who are not fluent in Spanish, potentially limiting the diversity and representativeness of the sample.

Additionally, the use of questionnaires that have been validated in a specific language (Spanish in this case) raises concerns about the validity and equivalency of the translated versions. Differences in language and cultural nuances can affect the interpretation and understanding of the questionnaire items, potentially affecting the accuracy of the data collected.

To enhance the inclusivity of the study and ensure broader applicability of the findings, it would have been beneficial to provide translated versions of the questionnaires or consider administering them in multiple languages to accommodate the diverse backgrounds of potential participants.

The study did not explore the potential causes of the high levels of burnout among correctional officers in Puerto Rico. While the study found a high prevalence of burnout among correctional officers in Puerto Rico and identified work stress and absenteeism as factors related to burnout, it did not investigate the underlying causes of these issues. Understanding the root causes of work stress and absenteeism could provide insights into potential interventions to reduce burnout among correctional officers. Additionally, the study did not explore the potential impact of burnout on the physical health of correctional officers, which could be an important area for future research.

Furthermore, while the study identified potential interventions to reduce stress and burnout among correctional officers, such as mindfulness, peer-mentoring programs, and cognitive behavioral therapy, it did not explore the feasibility or effectiveness of these interventions in the specific context of Puerto Rico. It is important to consider cultural and contextual factors when implementing interventions to ensure their effectiveness and relevance.

Overall, while the study provides important insights into the high levels of burnout among correctional officers in Puerto Rico, it did not explore the underlying causes of work stress and absenteeism or the potential impact of burnout on physical health. Additionally, the study did not explore the feasibility or effectiveness of potential interventions in the specific context of Puerto Rico.

Reviewer #2: Minor comments:

In line 62, the following sentence “When work stress becomes chronic, it strongly affects physical and mental health; today, 63 stress is considered a psychosocial risk in the workplace” should have a citation.

General Comments:

• Citations should be “[9].”, not “.[9]”

• Include the response rate and why 884 were excluded from the analysis. You could maybe include a sample flowchart.

• Please define what municipalities include the northern region and southern region, it is unclear. You could maybe include a map.

• Please include if any pilot testing was conducted for the survey instruments.

• The authors may want to address the potential public health impacts of their findings, since burnout among COs can also affect broader societal results.

• In the discussion, you should add, what steps could corrections facilities take to improve support for officers and address occupational burnout?

• Consider external factors that might influence burnout rates among COs in Puerto Rico. Are their political, economic, lack of personal, power outages, or sociocultural factors that could be exacerbating the issue?

Reviewer #3: The manuscript is well written. Suggestions were made to the discussion section where authors can discuss more in depth comparisons with other studies and implications of current results. Additionally, a recommendation about cultural differences between countries compared should be provided.

We suggest eliminating the words "association between" from the tittle and using the following: "Work stress and burnout among active correctional officers in Puerto Rico: a cross-sectional study"

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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: Yes: Laura T. Cabrera-Rivera

Reviewer #3: Yes: Nancy R. Cardona Cordero

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Attachments

Attachment

Submitted filename: PONE-D-23-15710_reviewer.pdf

PONE-D-23-15710R1“Work stress and burnout among active correctional officers in Puerto Rico: a cross-sectional study”PLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Diaz-Algorri,

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.

 Your paper has been re-reviewed. While the comments of all the referees are quite positive, there is a short set of issues still needing your attention. Please refer to the comments provided by our Reviewer # 2 regarding the statistical treatment (e.g., outliers and possible impacts of analytic decisions on the study outcomes). Please try to provide a very thoughtful and reasoned set of responses in these regards, in order to ask the reviewer for a prompt reconsideration of their editorial suggestion.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Apr 20 2024 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,

Sergio A. Useche, 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.

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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 #2: All comments have been addressed

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 #1: Partly

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: Yes

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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 #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

Reviewer #3: 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 #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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 #1: (No Response)

Reviewer #2: While removing outliers for the distance variable is a reasonable approach to avoid skewing the data distribution, providing more context around how outliers were defined and what proportion of data was removed would allow for better assessment of the impact this preprocessing step had on the analysis results.

Reviewer #3: (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 #1: Yes: Yohannes Habtegiorgis Abate

Reviewer #2: No

Reviewer #3: No

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[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.

“Work stress and burnout among active correctional officers in Puerto Rico: a cross-sectional study”

PONE-D-23-15710R2

Dear Dr. Diaz-Algorri,

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.

An invoice will be generated when your article is formally accepted. Please note, if your institution has a publishing partnership with PLOS and your article meets the relevant criteria, all or part of your publication costs will be covered. Please make sure your user information is up-to-date by logging into Editorial Manager at Editorial Manager® and clicking the ‘Update My Information' link at the top of the page. If you have any questions relating to publication charges, please contact our Author Billing department directly at authorbilling@plos.org.

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,

Sergio A. Useche, Ph.D.

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Thanks so much for the soundness of your amendments and improvements.

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

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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: 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 #2: 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 #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: Yes: Laura T. Cabrera-Rivera

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