Title: Rural-urban migration as a factor associated with physical and sexual intimate partner
violence Peru 2015-2017: a secondary analysis of a national study.
Version: 3 Date: 11 Feb 2022
Reviewer:  Tina L. Bloom
Reviewer's report:
Hello authors! I maintain my previous enthusiasm for your well-done and largely well-written
paper. It has so many strengths, including that it is an analysis of data from a population-based
data set. Your revisions are excellent and well-done and have made a really nice paper even
better. I have just a few comments or suggestions on the most recent version, submitted for your
consideration.
1. Is this the first and only paper to analyze internal migration patterns and IPV in Peru, using a
large, population-based dataset? If so,  you should highlight this strength.  Consider beginning
your discussion section with such a statement. It's a significant contribution to the literature.
2. In the description of the measures in your methods section, can you please add some
information describing the variable "alcohol consumption by partner"? What was the specific
question (s) women were asked?  It's currently missing.  It would be helpful to understand if this
means, say, any alcohol consumption, problematic alcohol consumption, drinking to get drunk,
etc. and over what referent time frame.
3. In your discussion section you note that rural-urban migration was the only migration category
you looked at where migration and IPV remained associated after adjusting for the confounding
variables.  Please consider also noting (maybe in your first paragraph of the discussion section)
that rural-urban migration was *also* the most common pattern of internal migration in Peru
in your data. Specifically, of the four patterns of internal migration you looked at (rural-
rural, urban-urban, rural-urban, and urban-rural, N=26,974), rural-urban migration represented
the most common form of internal migration and largest single category (45.2% of internal
migration, n=12,204).  You should add this point to your discussion section.
Why  this is important to highlight:  because there are also some service/policy/practice
implications here. Your data is showing that rural-urban migrants in Peru are not just a group
of women who are disproportionately impacted by IPV,  but also that they are the largest group
of internal migrants in Peru. This is particularly important because abused women often face
barriers services -- a point you already make in your discussion around line 282 -- and migrants
to another community may be particularly unlikely to be aware of available services.  So your
data suggests service providers should perhaps be considering specific outreach and services to
internal migrants. It would be useful to say that directly.
4. Your data also has other service/practice and perhaps research implications that  you should
consider highlighting in your discussion. For example, women among this rural-urban migrant
group had the highest prevalence of exposure to witnessing IPV as children of any migrant
group (as measured by reporting physical aggression by their father against their mother); they
mostly spoke Spanish, they nearly all had at least one child, and about one out of three didn't
know the symptoms of STDs. About one out of three didn't have paid work. About 1 out of 5
reported alcohol consumption by their partner. Most of these things were associated with IPV
risk -- indeed, you treated them as confounding variables for this reason. They also represent
important considerations for psychoeducation, counseling, and safety planning interventions for
abused rural-urban migrant women. For example, it's helpful to consider that Spanish-language
services will likely reach the majority of such women, and that they may need or be interested
in services and safety planning for their children (and that children may be also impacted by
IPV),  that their own childhood exposures to IPV might be significant and useful to address, that
STD education, employment support, and safety strategies for when a partner has been drinking
might be important components of safety planning for this population.
5. Another likely research gap that comes to mind is understanding the service gaps for internal
migrants, what kinds of outreach and services would be most accessible and useful, or what
abused women who are rural-urban migrants describe as their needs -- what are their priorities
for help and support, from their perspective.
6. Please check % in Table 2 for age (cell L13) -- I think there is a typo.
Hope this is helpful. Please continue your important work -- it is needed.