PONE-D-23-10602Shifting employment and perceptions of household responsibilities during early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic in NevadaPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Coughenour,

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. Both reviewers have addressed the merits of the paper. In the meantime, they also raised detailed section-by-section comments on how to enhance the paper quality. The authors are thus requested to revise their paper thoroughly and make sure to address those detailed comments made by the two reviewers, especially those critical comments on methodology and data samples.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Dec 27 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.

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Chenfeng Xiong

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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2.  You indicated that ethical approval was not necessary for your study. We understand that the framework for ethical oversight requirements for studies of this type may differ depending on the setting and we would appreciate some further clarification regarding your research. Could you please provide further details on why your study is exempt from the need for approval and confirmation from your institutional review board or research ethics committee (e.g., in the form of a letter or email correspondence) that ethics review was not necessary for this study? Please include a copy of the correspondence as an ""Other"" file.

3.  In the ethics statement in the Methods, you have specified that verbal consent was obtained. Please provide additional details regarding how this consent was documented and witnessed, and state whether this was approved by the IRB .

4.  Thank you for stating in your Funding Statement:

“This project was partially supported by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as part of a subaward totaling $3.4 million from the Nevada Division of Public and Behavioral Health's Epidemiology and Laboratory Capacity award. The contents are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement by, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or the U.S. government.

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

Please provide an amended statement that declares *all* the funding or sources of support (whether external or internal to your organization) received during this study, as detailed online in our guide for authors at http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submit-now.  Please also include the statement “There was no additional external funding received for this study.” in your updated Funding Statement.

Please include your amended Funding Statement within your cover letter. We will change the online submission form on your behalf.

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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: Partly

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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: No

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: Thank you for the opportunity to read this very interesting paper. The paper has many strengths that should be of interest to the journal audience. Thus, the following suggestions are around enhancing the presentation for publication and clarifying aspects of the data and reporting.

I will go by line number for the most part. If not, I will try to be as specific as possible in noting the area I am speaking about.

Overall

The manuscript should be shortened

Abstract

[Line 47] Background:. It is necessary to include the country.

Where are values and p-values? (p < .001). Authors must specify it. P values showing the differences between groups should be given.

Methods. Did you use some scales? If not, it is necessary to detailed the variables

1. Introduction

Authors must speak more about gender, status, types of works, and race, the adverse working conditions related to COVID-19, which are the consequences of shifting employment. What is the meaning of household responsibilities?

Please consider stating clear in your text which was the exact understudied population (population of interest) and how it was defined.

The prevalence and incidence of COVID-19 in the area of study during the period of study should be discussed.

It is not clear why the study was necessary

Authors must finish with the main aim.

2. Materials and Methods

Did the authors calculate the needed sample size? Please, clarify. How was the sample size determined? Did the authors test power calculation? How was the sample chosen? Authors must specify it.

Do the authors have a study protocol? The study protocol should be described in detail.

Which is the ID number? (ID number…..:2020). Interventionary studies involving animals or humans, and other studies require ethical approval must list the authority that provided approval and the corresponding ethical approval code. Please include the date and code register number of ethics committee.

Please add the response options for each demographic variable in the study

There isn’t enough detail to repeat the experiments.

Are any potential confounding factors considered?

DESIGN AND PROCEDURE: they should specify the design of the study they have carried out, and describe thoroughly how the data collection process was carried out, as well as issues such as voluntariness of participation and/or anonymity.

POPULATION and SAMPLE: It is necessary to describe the population size of the Nevada, and from this data, provide a calculation of the sample size necessary for the results to be meaningful. It is also necessary to specify the inclusion and exclusion criteria for the study sample.

VARIABLES: In relation to the items that were created "ad hoc", it is also necessary to better describe how these items were agreed (literature review, expert consensus, etc.).

ETHICAL CONSIDERATIONS: You should include a sub-heading under Methods that describes these issues: provide the reference number of the Ethics Committee approval, describe how the confidentiality of the data has been guaranteed.

3. Results

Table 1. Please, provide the n and not only %

At last, but not least, I recommend you to make available your data in an open repository. I think it will make this scientific process more transparent, and it allows other researchers to replicate your results.

4. Discussion

I think that the discussion section could be shortened by not repeating survey results

Moreover, some points were not discussed, i.e., the participants were assessed from December, 2020, since a fatigue scenario could exist due to Covid-19 social restrictions; how could this factor impact these participants?

Limitations related with the type of methodology used. Limitations regarding representativeness of respondents should be better addressed. Authors must specify it. The fact of having a convenience sample should be included in the limitations of the study.

I wish you all the best.

Reviewer #2: Intro: First paragraph- would be helpful to have death estimates at time of survey instead of July 2022

Intro: lines 91-92, it is unclear at time of survey what type of closures were in place for gaming industry

Methods- more details are needed about the sampling frame (list of phone numbers) and sampling procedures. Who provided this frame? Were quotas employed for age-sex? etc.

Methods: Please provide a statistical justification for the sample size

Methods: The response rate is a result and not a method. More details about the disposition codes and survey rates are needed. See AAPOR standard guidelines.

Results: Please be consistent with decimal point reporting (i.e sometimes you report 67%, 67.0% and 67.00%

Results: line 185- reword "moderately significant" to something else like, "Although not significant...list pvalue

Results: Table 1 shows demographics of full sample (n=1000) but sample size of 777 is used for main analyeses (Table 5). Please include a supplemental table that looks at demographic distribution of the full sample and regression sample to see if there is any potential selection bias.

Results/Methods: The authors mentioned restricting data set to those without missing data. Income level has the largest amount of missing data (n=192). Did the authors look at relaxing this criteria so that a larger dataset could be used for analyses

Result Table 4...there is an error in percentages for males (29.85% is in both columns)

Results table 7. I would defer to a proper statistician, but it seems like this could be more robustly assessed through an interaction term. If you are presenting Table 7 as a main finding, please include the demographics of this sub-sample.

Results: why not present weighted estimates for some of the key outcomes? especially given the biases the authors mentioned in the demographics of the sample.

Abstract- the reporting that women have more household work is misleading. Overall, there was minimal difference in lesss/more/no diff by gender

Limitations: Need to add that study was (probably, I'm guessing) not powered for sub-group analyses

Results and Abstract... overall I think the results section could be tightened up a little bit. It seems like there is a lot of mention in covariates that are significant in univariate models but not in multivariate models. Table 5 and 6 are the main adjusted regression tables where only age was significantly associated for both outcomes. Quite surprisingly, gender and race/ethnicity are not significantly associated. This gets a little lost in the presentation of results and the discussion. For example, the paragraph starting at line 342. "Responses also revealed the elevated toll of the pandemic on females when it comes to housework?. Consider tempering the conclusion

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Reviewer #1: Yes: Juan Jesús García-Iglesias

Reviewer #2: No

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PONE-D-23-10602R1Shifting employment and perceptions of household responsibilities during early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic in Nevada , USAPLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Coughenour,

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 address the remaining comments from the reviewers.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Jun 13 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,

Chenfeng Xiong

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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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 #3: (No Response)

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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: Yes

Reviewer #3: Partly

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #3: No

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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: No

Reviewer #3: (No Response)

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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 #3: (No Response)

**********

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 #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: Juan Jesús García-Iglesias

Reviewer #3: Yes: Harumitsu Suzuki

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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.

Attachments

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Submitted filename: review.docx

Shifting employment and perceptions of household responsibilities during early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic  in Nevada , USA

PONE-D-23-10602R2

Dear Dr. Coughenour,

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,

Chenfeng Xiong

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

**********

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: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to read your interesting research. I look forward to reading further reports. My question is solved from your response.　I have no further questions.

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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 #3: Yes: Harumitsu Suzuki

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