Research related to COVID-19

Research themes

The impacts of COVID on primary education

While primary schools were enormously resourceful in finding ways to respond to the challenges COVID posed locally, policymakers struggled to make good decisions at a national level. The incapacity of policymakers to draw on practitioner knowledge at a time of crisis hampered system functioning. Insights from IOE research suggested a need to rebalance how practitioner, research and policymaking communities interact. 

Read about the findings, download policy briefing notes, reports and publications at Primary Education during COVID. 

Family life

FACT Covid: Families and Community Transitions under Covid 

Dr Humera Iqbal, Dr Katherine Twamley and Dr Charlotte Faircloth conducted a multi-country research project examining both how individuals respond to public health measures put in place, and how these are negotiated with others in the household and family, particularly across gender and generations. 

Their book, Family Life in the Time of COVID, offers in-depth case study insights into how families in 10 countries made sense of lockdown policies, coped with collective worry about the unknown, managed finances, fed themselves, and got to grips with online work and schooling. 

Coping and wellbeing in families during the COVID-19 crisis 

Dr Katie Quy and Dr Lisa Fridkin investigated coping and wellbeing in children aged 7-11 years, and their families. The project explored what types of coping strategies were protective or harmful, and how to help children manage and ‘recover’. 

Families in Tower Hamlets: impacts of COVID-19 

What was everyday life like for young families in the midst of a pandemic? The research team, led by Professor Claire Cameron, worked with Born in Bradford, a cohort study aiming to reduce health inequalities, to examine Covid-19's social, economic and health impacts. 

Study findings supported Tower Hamlets council to shape its service offer to all families with young children, especially those newly impoverished and those designated vulnerable: pregnant women, and children. 

Read about the findings, download reports and publications at Families in Tower Hamlets.   

Secondary school

Moving Up: optimising secondary school transition processes during the COVID-19 pandemic 

Led by Professor Sandra Leaton Gray, this project produced digestible guidance for Year 6 students and their teachers, to help to help them navigate the transition from primary to secondary school during the Covid-19 pandemic.  

Read the report, discussions of the study findings and find the guide resources within the Department of Curriculum, Pedagogy and Assessment’s completed projects collection. 

COVID-19 impact on young peoples' learning, motivation, wellbeing, and aspirations 

This study, led by Professor Lindsey Macmillan, asked whether the pandemic and unprecedented school closures affected secondary school pupils in England. 

COVID Social Mobility and Opportunities Study (COSMO) 

This major longitudinal youth cohort study provided vital new evidence on the pandemic’s effect on socio-economic inequalities in life chances. Led by Professor Jake Anders, the project is sharing policy-relevant evidence across a wide range of educational and employment outcomes.  

It will continue to follow the medium and long-term effects on young people who were in Tear 11 in the academic year 2020-21, as they move through further and higher education and into the labour market. 

Advancing into further and higher education and work

Student to degree mismatch: the role of schools, and the impact of disruption from COVID-19 

Led by Dr Gill Wyness, this project examined the impact of exam cancellations on student-to-course mismatch, comparing characteristics of mismatched students (by school type and socioeconomic status) in 2020 versus 2019.  

COVID-19 youth economic activity and health (YEAH) monitor 

This research project led by Dr Golo Henseke addressed the UK's need for robust evidence on the pandemic's consequences for youth employment, learning and wellbeing. The YEAH project findings highlight the need for robust education and training systems to support young people during and after the pandemic, including consequences for mental health resilience.

The study showed that training and work experience placements were crucial in preventing perceived skills loss during the pandemic. Worries about lost learning were found to significantly impact the well-being and future optimism of young people.

Mental health and wellbeing

COVID-19: Global social trust and mental health 

Dr Keri Wong led an international study looking at the short and long-term effects of COVID-19 on individual's social trust in relationships, mental and physical health. By involving UCL and three international universities (USA, Singapore, and Italy), the research enabled comparisons between the UK's lockdown experience and the experiences in other countries where different COVID guidelines were adopted.

More reports in this theme:

• A 2024 report from the Play Observatory project, led by Professor John Potter, explored children’s play, demonstrating its power to boost children’s agency, resilience and mental health, while helping them navigate disruption to their lives during the Covid-19 lockdowns. 

• British adults aged 50 and above experienced their highest-ever levels of mental ill health during the COVID-19 pandemic, possibly triggering a second 'mid-life crisis' in mental health to surpass the well-known peak in midlife, according to research led by Dr Darío Moreno-Agostino. 

• Dr Vanessa Moulton led a study which found the COVID-19 pandemic disproportionately affected the livelihoods and financial circumstances of adults with persistent mental health problems. 

Public health

Post-pandemic, a new type of vaccine scepticism has emerged online that claims certain vaccines are not “real vaccines”. The research from Lancaster University and co-authored by IOE’s Dr Zsófia Demjén says better public health communication is needed. 

Dr Katy Sutcliffe and Professor James Thomas developed a living systematic map of COVID-19 evidence covering topics including health impacts, transmission and social and economic impacts, among others. Living evidence is essential for policy makers to manage large volumes of rapidly shifting scientific evidence during a crisis and make good decisions. 

IOE joined the ‘Collaboration for change: Promoting vaccine uptake’ project to understand vaccine hesitancy in ethnic minority groups. It identified three key factors: lack of trust, lack of culturally and linguistically appropriate information, and inconvenient vaccination locations and timings. 

Special educational needs

A cross-country analysis co-led by Professor Jo Van Herwegen found that for individuals with neurodevelopmental conditions and their families, government decisions in response to COVID-19 mattered less than loss of routine for families’ anxiety and stress levels during the pandemic’s early stages. 

Professor Caroline Oliver, Professor Carol Vincent and Dr Georgia Pavlopoulou explored autistic children and young people’s educational experiences as well as that of their parents. 

Culture and heritage

Dr Sara Young investigated the effect of the COVID-19 lockdown on children’s heritage language learning. The study explored how Polish supplementary schools in the UK continued their work during lockdown, including grading students on their GCSE and A level Polish exams. 

Dr Ada Mau and Dr Lu Gram (Institute for Global Health) led the UCL Grand Challenges-funded project called ‘We are not the virus - The experiences and impact of COVID on East & Southeast Asian heritage young people in London’. This study investigated East and Southeast Asian (ESEA) young Londoners’ experiences of the pandemic, and the impact on their families, education, health, and social identities; explored ESEA youth perspectives on the pandemic and the future; and related findings to broader issues of race, inequalities and COVID-19’s impact. 

Minoritised groups

Dr Dylan Kneale developed a survey to examine whether sexuality-based inequalities risked being exacerbated due to the pandemic. 

Led by Professor Carol Rivas, the Coronavirus Intersectionalities: Chronic Conditions and Disabilities and Migrants / Ethnic minoritisation Awareness study (CICADA-ME) explored participants’ access to and experiences of health, social care, and formal and informal support networks. Participant’s stories were brought to life on stage in the Bloomsbury Theatre in 2022. 

Dr Elaine Chase collaborated with researchers at the University of Liverpool and University of Southampton to explore how the pandemic has affected young unaccompanied asylum-seekers in England legally and socially. The research found that Covid-19 compounded existing problems in the UK’s asylum system, leading to lengthy delays and disruption in essential services for young unaccompanied asylum seekers. 

More research 

• The Centre for Longitudinal Studies (CLS) launched a nationwide survey of the participants of five national longitudinal cohort studies, to examine the pandemic’s impact. 

• Professors Allison Littlejohn and Martin Oliver started the 'UCL Moving to Online Teaching and Homeworking (MOTH)' study, examining the experiences of university staff moving to online teaching and working in response to COVID-19. Professor Littlejohn discussed the project in the Research for the Real World S02E01 podcast 'How working from home is working (or not)'. 

• Professor David Voas collaborated with researchers in the United States and Australia on computational simulations of human factors in managing the COVID-19 pandemic. These included people’s willingness to comply with infection suppression measures, such as social distancing. 

• Dr Kirstine Hansen looked at what happened to crime in London as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

• Dr Roberto Filippi and Dr Matt Somerville led a new project examining how effective homeschooling was for pupils. 

• Melissa Bond worked on a new project examining which technology parents believe would support their children to learn most effectively during lockdown. 

• Dr Yana Manyukhina led a project that investigated the impact of living and learning under a pandemic on children’s education and wellbeing.