Whitehouse, Kimberley

Jones, Kimberley
Start date:
October 2022
Research Topic:
Locked In: How children made sense of the COVID-19 lockdown
Research pathway:
Research Supervisor:
Dr Kate Moles and Dr Charlotte Bates
Supervising school:
School of Social Sciences,
Primary funding source:
ESRC Wales DTP

COVID-19 severely impacted the global population resulting in numerous national lockdowns and millions of deaths. The subsequent lockdowns forced the population to stay indoors, resulting in declines in mental health, financial instability, and fear of infection. Current research is beginning to explore the impacts of COVID-19 and the lockdowns, but little to no attention is focused on children’s experiences.

This project will explore children’s and young people’s experiences of the lockdown in the United Kingdom and begin to understand how they made sense of the situation. I aim to use creative methods to collect data, allowing children to express their thoughts and feelings creatively. This method was chosen as it is child-friendly and encourages children to express their views in their own words, in the hope to minimise misinterpretation but also highlight their voices in conversations about moving forward with the coronavirus.