Current Research
List viewEconomists from around the world are using real time data collection to better understand the impact the Covid-19 crisis is having on families, workers, firms and society, and how policies can help the recovery out of the crisis. Find out more about how these research teams are carrying out their projects, and what their findings are below.
Identifying and mitigating the impact of Covid-19 on inequalities experienced by people from BAME backgrounds working in health and social care
Prior to Covid-19, the NHS England Workforce Race Equalities Standard (WRES) found that BAME staff experience considerably greater levels of workplace harassment and discrimination, lower pay, less control and poorer working conditions than non-BAME ...
Primary Topic: Jobs, work, pay & benefits
Secondary Topic: Inequality & poverty
Lead investigator: Stephani Hatch
Countries
Understanding the impacts of Covid-19 on the provision of NHS health care and patient outcomes
We will provide a detailed description of the extent to which non-Covid-19 NHS activity has been affected by Covid-19, who is most affected, and how patient outcomes have changed. Covid-19 has led to enormous changes in the provision of NHS care. All...
Primary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Lead investigator: Carol Propper
Countries
Will Covid-19 change what the public expect of government?
Previous research on pandemics, infectious disease, and recession suggests that Covid-19 could have a significant impact on the public’s public policy preferences - and thus the environment in which policymakers will have to address the pandemic’...
Primary Topic: Attitudes, media & governance
Secondary Topic: Recession & recovery
Lead investigator: John Curtice
Countries
How is the Covid-19 accidental experiment around working from home changing the way the UK will work after lockdown?
This research is designed to support economic recovery from the Covid-19 crisis, providing timely, actionable insight and recommendations about Working from Home (WfH), and the long-term implications of crisis-driven adaptations for organisational pr...
Primary Topic: Recession & recovery
Secondary Topic: Jobs, work, pay & benefits
Lead investigator: Jane Parry
Countries
Pandemic policing: public attitudes towards compliance and organisational resilience
The UK’s Covid-19 response has provided the police with new powers which potentially impinge upon civil liberties, altering the nature of policing activities. National policing bodies have encouraged a compliance not coercion approach based upon th...
Primary Topic: Attitudes, media & governance
Secondary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Lead investigator: Sarah Charman
Countries
Addressing inclusivity in the spatial and social impacts of Covid-19 on the self-employed in the UK
The self-employed are a particularly vulnerable group in this current crisis. In contrast to elsewhere, the UK has seen significant growth in self-employment, now reaching 15% of the workforce. They are predominant in those sectors most hit by shutdo...
Primary Topic: Jobs, work, pay & benefits
Secondary Topic: Inequality & poverty
Lead investigator: Darja Reuschke
Countries
Carrying the work burden of the Covid-19 pandemic: working class women in the UK
Working class women are carrying the burden of the extra physical and emotional labour being generated by the Covid-19 pandemic. These women care for children, sick and frail elderly, clean buildings, cook and serve food, administer institutions and ...
Primary Topic: Families & households
Secondary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Lead investigator: Tracey Warren
Countries
Covid-19 (mis)information exposure and messaging effects in the United Kingdom
This project will examine four specific research questions about Covid-19 information and beliefs. 1. How (mis)informed is the public about the Covid-19 pandemic? 2. In this time of crisis, are people making sense of the world through widespread adop...
Primary Topic: Attitudes, media & governance
Lead investigator: Jason Reifler
Countries
Monitoring socioeconomic and mental health trajectories through the Covid-19 pandemic
This study will use the nationally representative data collected monthly by the UKHLS COVID panel to assess the pandemic’s ongoing impact on individuals’ mental health and financial situation, and how this differs among subgroups of the UK popula...
Primary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Secondary Topic: Families & households
Lead investigator: Neil R Smith
Countries
Identifying and mitigating the individual and dyadic impact of Covid-19 and life under physical distancing on people with dementia and carers (INCLUDE)
People with dementia say that personal contact is key to their well-being, while many family members providing unpaid care are isolated and feel lonely. People with dementia and the family members who care for them are especially vulnerable to the im...
Primary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Lead investigator: Linda Clare
Countries
Psychosocial effects of the Covid-19 pandemic: identifying mental health problems and supporting wellbeing in vulnerable children and families
There is an urgent need to understand and mitigate the psychological and social impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic and associated lockdown on primary school children. This is especially important for those known to be vulnerable. Children with emotiona...
Primary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Secondary Topic: Schools, universities & training
Lead investigator: Stephanie van Goozen
Countries
Gemini Covid-19 study: immediate and longer-term impacts on the health, behaviour and wellbeing of U.K. families
The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on U.K. families goes far beyond the devastating health implications of the virus itself. Added family stresses, including income loss, excessive confinement, social isolation and anxieties about health and educati...
Primary Topic: Families & households
Secondary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Lead investigator: Alison Fildes
Countries
Social learning about Covid-19 vulnerability and social distancing in high density populations: the case of UK urban dwelling Bangladeshis
Early epidemiology indicates older members of Britain’s Bangladeshi communities are disproportionately affected by Covid-19 related morbidity and mortality. Bangladeshis are more likely to have comorbidities and live in poorer, overcrowded areas in...
Primary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Secondary Topic: Inequality & poverty
Lead investigator: Chris Tang
Countries
British election study
Wave 20 of the BES internet panel will ask questions on Covid-19 and its impact on political opinion including exposure (individual and family), evaluations/handling and impact on issue position and salience.
Primary Topic: Attitudes, media & governance
Lead investigator: Edward Fieldhouse
Countries
Centre for longitudinal studies
A nationwide survey of the participants of five national longitudinal cohort studies, to examine the impact of the pandemic, help understand how people at different life stages are affected, and how prior life experiences shape resilience or vulnerab...
Primary Topic: Families & households
Secondary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Lead investigator: Alissa Goodman
Countries
consumer data research centre (CDRC)
Using footfall data supplied from Huq Industries to analyse changes in activity levels during the period of the lockdown.
Primary Topic: Recession & recovery
Lead investigator: Prof. James Cheshire
Countries
RELIEF centre
The Future Education team of the RELIEF Centre have started a collaboration with the Lebanese University (LU) to develop a massive online open course (MOOC) focused on remote learning, framed within the context of the Covid-19 pandemic but also appli...
Primary Topic: Schools, universities & training
Secondary Topic: Science, technology & innovation
Lead investigator: Diana Laurillard
Post Covid-19, what will be the ‘new normal’ energy demand in buildings?
Since September 2019, 1,700 bill payers have agreed to share for research purposes, their half hourly gas and electricity smart meter data with SERL. This data will be combined with a Covid-19 questionnaire about changes to occupant energy using beha...
Primary Topic: Energy & climate change
Lead investigator: Tadj Oreszczyn
Countries
ESRC mental health research network
The Covid-19 Social Study is a panel study of the psychological and social experiences of adults in the UK during the outbreak of the novel coronavirus run by University College London. Over 75,000 people are currently participating in the study, com...
Primary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Lead investigator: Dr Daisy Fancourt
Countries
Nature engagement and wellbeing pre-, during and post Covid-19: supporting the UK (green) recovery
Engagement with nature benefits wellbeing (Twohigg-Bennet, 2019), but theory development in this area is limited. With free movement restricted during lockdown and health and wellbeing threatened by Covid-19, it is especially important now to underst...
Primary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Lead investigator: Biritta Gatersleben
Countries
