Our studies
Here you can search our series of working papers, dating back to 1983. These papers use data from our four cohort studies and cover a wide range of topics, from social inequalities and mobility, to physical health, education and cognitive development. Other papers in the series seek to improve the practice of longitudinal research. At the present time, we are only able to accept papers if at least one author is a member of the CLS research team. Some of the working papers below will subsequently have been published in peer-reviewed journals.
For more information about our working papers series, please email us at clsworkingpapers@ucl.ac.uk.
This report aims to investigate the opportunity and feasibility of the use of technologies to measure mental health in Centre of Longitudinal Studies (CLS) cohorts, and the opportunity and feasibility of linking CLS cohorts to nationally held records on mental health service use.
While adult children with siblings can share caring for older parents, adult only children face this responsibility alone. Yet, despite the extensive literature on informal caregiving more generally, research on only children’s parent-care is limited. Given increased longevity and reliance on informal caregiving, as well as an increase in one-child families, there is a need to further investigate only children’s caregiving. This paper investigates whether and how adult only children’s parent-care differs from those with siblings, how sibling composition intersects with gender and how it relates to wellbeing. Using data from three large scale British birth cohorts we analyse parent-care at different ages: 38 and 42 (born 1970), 50 and 55 (born 1958), and 63 (born 1946). Results show that only children are more likely to provide parent-care, with differences greater at later ages. Provision is gendered, and the sibling group composition matters for involvement. While caring is related to wellbeing, we found no evidence that this differs between only children and those with siblings.
A sequential mixed mode data collection, online-to-telephone, was introduced into the National Child Development Study for the first time at the study’s age 55 sweep in 2013. The study included a small experiment, whereby a randomised subset of study members was allocated to a single mode, telephone-only interview, in order to test for the presence of mode effects on participation and measurement. Relative to telephone-only, the offer of the web increased overall participation rates by 5.0 percentage points (82.8% vs. 77.8%, 95% confidence interval 2.7% to 7.3%). Differences attributable to mode of interview were detected in levels of item non-response and response values for a limited number of questions.
This paper addresses the question of whether attending a private school (both at primary and secondary stages) affects voting behaviour and political attitudes in adulthood. The analysis is based upon the British Cohort Study, a nationally representative cohort of children born in one week in April 1970 at age 42 years.
This paper describes the collection of saliva samples from cohort members and their biological parents in the Millennium Cohort Study. It analyses response rates, predictors of response, and details the DNA extraction, genotyping and imputation procedures performed on the data.
This paper presents a systematic data-driven approach to identify predictors of non-response at each sweep of the 1958 National Child Development Study (NCDS) and demonstrates that including such variables in analyses with principled methods can reduce bias due to missing data.
This paper presents a systematic data-driven approach to identify predictors of non-response at wave 8 (age 25-26 years) in Next Steps and demonstrates that including such variables in analyses with principled methods can reduce bias due to missing data.
This report sets out the rationale and sampling design options for a new UK birth cohort study, incorporating an accelerated longitudinal design.
This report gives an overview of the most relevant literature and evidence on the use mixed-mode involving web in longitudinal surveys.
This report looks at what major longitudinal studies have already done in terms of collecting data using new technologies and innovative methods, and explores the methodological challenges surrounding innovative data collection.
This paper reviews the literature on the effects of incentives in longitudinal studies.
This paper proposes a measure of ecological disadvantage– the Index of Local Area Relative Disadvantage (ILARD) – for use in comparative cross-country research on neighbourhood effects.
Find the latest developments and insights from across all our longitudinal studies.
The CLS Bibliography is a searchable database of published work based on our cohort studies. Search by keyword, author, date range and journal.
Data from our studies are mainly available through the UK Data Service. We run training to support researchers who are interested in using our studies in their work.
Centre for Longitudinal Studies
UCL Social Research Institute
20 Bedford Way
London WC1H 0AL
Email: clsdata@ucl.ac.uk
