This report by Co-SPACE, led by experts at the University of Oxford, shows that children and young people’s mental health has been negatively affected over the course of the Covid-19 pandemic. It shows that the behavioural, emotional and attentional difficulties of children changed considerably throughout the past year, increasing in times of national lockdown and decreasing as restrictions eased and schools reopened.
The study also highlights that children with SEN/ND and those from lower income households have been particularly vulnerable throughout the pandemic. Their parents or carers reported continuously elevated mental health symptoms with higher levels of behavioural, emotional, and attentional difficulties.
The Co-SPACE survey has been tracking children and young people’s mental health throughout the COVID-19 crisis. Survey results are helping researchers identify what protects children and young people from deteriorating mental health, over time, and at particular stress points, and how this may vary according to child and family characteristics. This will help to identify what advice, support and help parents would find most useful.
Children and Adolescent Mental Health
Throughout the first lockdown (March to June 2020), symptoms of behavioural and attentional difficulties consistently increased while symptoms of emotional difficulties remained relatively stable. As restrictions eased over the summer period, reported symptoms decreased and stabilised until December 2020. They then increased again in January 2021 when the new lockdown was introduced. Over the last month (February to March 2021), there was a sharp decrease in reported symptoms for all three subscales. Overall, parents/carers reported the highest level of symptoms of behavioural, emotional and attentional difficulties in June 2020 and February 2021.
Child age
On average (throughout the pandemic), parents/carers reported higher levels of symptoms of behavioural and attentional difficulties for primary (4-10 years old) compared to secondary (11-17 years old) school aged children. They reported similar levels of symptoms of emotional difficulties for both groups.