Children and COVID-19 Research Library

This study aimed to assess the associations between parents’ working conditions during the lockdown period (March-May 2020) and children’s health-related quality of life (HRQOL) over the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic in Zurich, Switzerland. It included 2211 children (6–16 years) and their parents from the prospective study Ciao Corona. Parents reported their employment status and working conditions during the lockdown. Children’s HRQOL was assessed in June-July 2020, January and March 2021 using the parents-report of the KINDL.

From March 2020, Australia introduced a range of policies to respond to COVID-19, most of which impacted significantly on the lives of children. This article applies a child-centred framework, developed from rights-based participatory research with children, to analyse how children have been represented in policy narratives around COVID-19 and the extent to which policy responses have been child-inclusive or child-centred.

As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, some governments issued mandates requiring that residential care providers rapidly return children and youth to family. The goal of the present study was to assess outcomes in a sample of families experiencing rapid unprepared return. Specifically, we sought to evaluate the placement stability, assess support services provided to families, and examine how services received impacted parental stress and family functioning. Participants and Setting: 115 families who had experienced rapid unprepared return across five nations, including Ethiopia, India, Kenya, Mexico, and Uganda.

While substantial research has emerged from the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as from studies with adolescent populations, there has been a dearth of research focused in South Africa on the context-specific experiences of healthcare workers (HCWs) and the adolescents and young people (AYP) to whom they provide services. This article documents the experiences of provision and receipt of HIV and sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services during the COVID-19 pandemic from the perspective of South African HCWs (n = 13) and AYP (n = 41, ages 17–29).

The COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent public health measures have resulted in a worsening of eating disorder symptoms and an increase in psychological distress. The present study examined symptoms and behaviors in adolescents and young adults with emotional eating, bingeing behaviors and binge eating disorder during the pandemic. Additionally, the study explored if individuals who experienced pandemic-related food availability and food affordability issues experienced increased binge-eating symptoms and negative feelings. Participants (n = 39) were a convenience sample who participated between November 2020 and January 2021 in a weight and lifestyle management program at an urban New England pediatric hospital. Participants completed online surveys that assessed (1) participant’s exposure to COVID-19 related stress and binge-eating behaviors using the COVID-19 Exposure and Family Impact Survey-Adolescent and Young Adult Version (CEFIS-AYA) and the Binge Eating Scale (BES) respectively, (2) participants’ and their families’ ability to attain and afford food and its association with bingeing behaviors, and (3) the relationship between food availability and affordability and negative emotions.

Maternal attitudes and beliefs have been shown to influence childhood vaccination coverage, resulting in under-vaccination, non-vaccination, and vaccination delay. This study aimed to investigate the mothers' attitudes and perceptions about vaccination for their children in Greece. This was an online cross-sectional study, conducted from 4 April to 8 June 2020. A self-administered questionnaire was used to collect information about mothers' and their children's socio-demographic characteristics, previous vaccination behavior, and mothers' attitudes and perceptions about childhood vaccination. Participants included adult mothers with at least one minor child.

Face masks are an effective and important tool to prevent the spread of COVID-19, including among children. However, occluding parts of the face can impact emotion recognition, which is fundamental to effective social interactions. Social distancing, stress, and changes to routines because of the pandemic have also altered the social landscape of children, with implications for social development. To better understand how social input and context impact emotion recognition, the current study investigated emotion recognition in children (7–12 years old, N = 131) using images of both masked and unmasked emotional faces.

This study examines health service indicators of stress-related presentations (relating to pain, mental illness, psychosomatic symptoms and self-harm) in adolescents of secondary school age, using Hospital Episode Statistics data for England. It examined weekly time series data for three academic years spanning the time before (2018–2019) and during the COVID-19 pandemic (2019–2020 and 2020–2021), including the first lockdown when schools were closed to the majority of pupils. For all secondary school children, weekly stress presentations dropped following school closures. However, patterns of elevated stress during school terms re-established after reopening, with girls aged 11–15 showing an overall increase compared with pre-pandemic rates.

Studies from the past decades have shown that mood disorders are common during childhood and adolescence. This study aimed to estimate the point prevalence of depression in Omani children and adolescents during social distancing and lockdown and identify the risk factors for developing depressive symptoms during the COVID-19 pandemic. This is an analytical cross-sectional study conducted in May 2020, in which all young Omani people attending a mainstream school aged 8–18 years old were eligible to participate. Parents were asked to complete the online survey, which consisted of the parent version of the Mood and Feelings Questionnaire (MFQ-Parent). In addition, the option of a self-reported version (MFQ-Self) was provided in cases where children preferred to fill out the survey themselves. Logistic regression was used to identify the contributing socio-demographic variables associated with depressive symptoms.

The LEARN-COVID pilot study collected data on infants and their parents during the COVID-19 pandemic. Assessments took place between April and July 2021. Parents (N = 357) from Switzerland (predominantly), Germany, and Austria answered a baseline questionnaire on their behaviour related to the pandemic, social support, infant nutrition, and infant regulation. Subsequently, parents (n = 222) answered a 10-day evening diary on infant nutrition, infant regulation, parental mood, and parental soothing behaviour. Data and documentation are stored on Zenodo, https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6946048. These data may be valuable to researchers interested in infant development and parenting during the pandemic as well as to researchers interested in daily variability in infant behaviour, parenting, and nutrition.

In Switzerland, from March 15th to May 11th 2020, schools and most shops were closed nationwide due to the COVID-19-related lockdown. This cessation of activities may have impacted weight gain in children and adolescents. The aims of our study were to evaluate the effects of the COVID-19 lockdown on the BMI of children and adolescents in treatment for obesity, and to compare its evolution to that of the previous year at the same time, as well as to that of normal-weight children. This retrospective study gathered demographic and anthropometric data from subjects aged 6–18 years both with normal weight and with obesity, who attended our hospital clinics at four time points: before and after the lockdown period in 2020, and at the same times of the year in 2019. We used paired t-tests to assess weight, BMI and BMI z-score changes, linear and standard multiple regressions, independent Student’s t-tests or Chi-square tests to compare groups, and Pearson correlation coefficient when appropriate.

This study explored how family communication patterns relate to parental knowledge about COVID-19, vaccine confidence, and intentions to vaccinate their children. Parents from 4 states (Ohio, New York, Georgia, and Texas; n = 702) completed an online survey in March 2021.