The Mental Health of UK Postgraduate Research Students following the COVID-19 Pandemic

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Dear Authors,

 

I really appreciate the opportunity to review the article titled "The Mental Health of UK Postgraduate Research Students following the COVID-19 Pandemic," which has been submitted for consideration for publication in the journal Education Sciences. The current study has no flaws in ethics, trial design, methods, or statistics. The study appears to follow relevant guidelines and provides an original contribution to the existing scientific literature. There are no flaws in the data presented, and there are no misleading or false conclusions. No plagiarism was detected.

 

I recommend this article for publication in Education Sciences in its current form.

 

Sincerely,

Reviewer

Author Response

Thank you for your work reviewing this paper, your comments are very appreciated.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This is an excellent study and contribution to the topic and clearly reflects significant engagement with the qualitative data. The analysis and quotes add depth to the quantitative data presented in the introduction.

As noted in the Limitations section, "the sample was self-selecting" (694). The article describes the eligibility criteria but does not provide information about the recruitment methodology. That would give additional context to the perspectives voiced in the article.

There are a number of places where the article provides a helpful introduction to a theme (e.g., PhD and emotions, lines 218-224). It would improve the flow of the section if the order of topics in the introductory paragraph matched the order of discussion that follows.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

There is a need to balance between fidelity to the data in quoting from interviews verbatim on the one hand and enhancing the readability of the thoughts being communicated on the other hand. Including the filler words (e.g., "like") is useful if the manner of speaking has implications for your analysis. If their specific style is not integral to your analysis, then it will be easier for your readers if you remove unnecessary fillers. Similarly, it was unclear whether the grammatical errors in the quote on lines 147-149 were intended or if they were typos.

Author Response

Please see the attachment.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

n/a