Dear Dr. Espinosa-Asuar,

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 Jul 26 2025 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.

• 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,

Alejandro Botero Carvajal, MD

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. We note that the grant information you provided in the ‘Funding Information’ and ‘Financial Disclosure’ sections do not match.

When you resubmit, please ensure that you provide the correct grant numbers for the awards you received for your study in the ‘Funding Information’ section.

3. Thank you for stating the following financial disclosure:

 [DGAPA, National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) under grant PAPIIT IA400223]. 

Please state what role the funders took in the study.  If the funders had no role, please state: ""The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.""

If this statement is not correct you must amend it as needed.

Please include this amended Role of Funder statement in your cover letter; we will change the online submission form on your behalf.

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

[This work was supported by DGAPA, National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) under grant PAPIIT IA400223. This grant PAPIIT IA400223 also funding scholarship of Geraldine Espinosa Lugo and Linda Gisele Zavala Hernández. We thank Nagapriya Wright for his impeccable translation. We appreciate the work of Camila Ramírez Araujo and Adriana Ruiz Gadea for collecting data.]

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:

[DGAPA, National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) under grant PAPIIT IA400223]. 

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

5. Please expand the acronym “DGAPA” (as indicated in your financial disclosure) so that it states the name of your funders in full.

This information should be included in your cover letter; we will change the online submission form on your behalf.

6. Please include captions for your Supporting Information files at the end of your manuscript, and update any in-text citations to match accordingly. Please see our Supporting Information guidelines for more information: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/supporting-information.

Additional Editor Comments:

In your Methods section please clearly state how names were determined to be "masculine" or "feminine" and how edge instances were handled.

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

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

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

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: Partly

**********

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

Reviewer #1: I Don't Know

Reviewer #2: No

**********

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

The PLOS Data policy

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

**********

Reviewer #1: This research explores an important topic, and the comparisons across STEM fields are valuable. The differences across discipline identified are interesting, and the explanation provided for those differences plausible. I would recommend some revisions to address some lingering questions and concerns.

First, and most importantly, I would recommend moving the methodology section from the end of the paper, so that it appears prior to the presentation of the results. It's actually hard to understand the findings without having the explanation of what data are being drawn on, and how they are being analysed. The findings will be more comprehensible if you describe what you did ahead of time.

Second, the methodology section can be expanded to provide explanations for key variables, so that people unfamiliar with academia in Mexico can better follow. For example, you provide a brief explanation of PRIDE and SN1, but it was not sufficient for me to understand what these programs are and therefore how to interpret gender differences with respect to them. Some aspects of the methodology are well-explained, but others are less explained.

Third, you provide an explanation for how gender differences vary across discipline, but it wasn't clear that your data allowed you to test or support your explanation. Neither was it entirely clear that there was a robust body of literature that would support your conclusions, over other potential explanations for the differences. Did you have any measure for cultural capital, for example? In the conclusion, you write, "Fields with high cultural capital create significant symbolic obstacles for women, whereas those with lower cultural capital impose structural challenges." It wasn't clear to me what this (and similar) statements are based on. Is there evidence of 'symbolic obstacles' or variations in cultural capital across fields? Why symbolic obstacles (versus discrimination or social closure for example)? It seems like your data is primarily objective data on employment and recognition, with some ability to assess trends over time. However, there didn't seem to be any clear data that allowed you to understand why these differences occur. As a result, I am not convinced that your data entirely supports your conclusions.

Fourth, you might want to also move the 'What is the underlying problem?' section. It is good to establish the 'problem' earlier in the paper. Here too, though, you should be careful not to declare that your findings support conclusions about structural and symbolic barriers, when it is not clear on what variables or analyses these conclusions are based. If you do have evidence of structural and symbolic barriers in academia, please be clearer about what these are.

Thanks for an interesting study.

Reviewer #2: 1-All comparisons are presented descriptively (proportions and means) without significance testing. Incorporate appropriate tests such as chi-square for rank/incentive distributions, t-tests or nonparametric equivalents for promotion intervals, and report p-values or confidence intervals to support claims about gender differences.

2-State explicitly whether this is a purely descriptive case-study or part of a mixed-methods design. If it is hypothesis‐driven, articulate the specific hypotheses being tested (e.g., “women in pSTEM will show shorter promotion intervals than women in STEM”).

3-Provide a flowchart or table listing each data source, date accessed, query parameters (e.g., “all personnel records with active status as of July 1, 2023”), and any filters applied (e.g., exclusion of emeritus staff until 2018).

4-By expanding the Methods to include precise search protocols, clear variable definitions, inferential and multivariable analyses, and transparent code/ethics statements, the authors will substantially improve the study’s credibility, reproducibility, and impact.

**********

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: Yes:  Muhammad Shahzad Aslam

**********

[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.

Feminization of the precarious at the UNAM: examining obstacles to gender equality

PONE-D-25-15103R1

Dear Dr. Espinosa-Asuar,

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. For questions related to billing, please contact billing support .

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,

Alejandro Botero Carvajal, Ph.D

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Reviewer #1:

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed

**********

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

**********

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

**********

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

The PLOS Data policy

Reviewer #1: Yes

**********

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

Reviewer #1: Yes

**********

Reviewer #1: The author have addressed my concerns and questions on the previous draft. I enjoyed reading this version of the paper.

**********

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

**********