Mental health, school achievement and Covid-19 – long-term consequences and protective factors
Short description
This project highlights the declining school achievement and increasing stress and mental illness among Swedish adolescents. The Covid-19 pandemic has further exacerbated these challenges. There is a lack of studies on the effects of earlier grading in grade 6, introduced in Sweden in 2012/2013, on motivation, mental health, and future achievements.
The project aims to address this knowledge gap, focusing on adolescents who experienced earlier grading and distance learning during the pandemic.
The goal is to understand the long-term effects on mental health, achievement, and life opportunities, particularly for vulnerable student groups. The studies will utilize longitudinal data from population and cohort databases to explore various research questions related to grading, mental health, and special education support.
Background
During the past decades, we have witnessed diminishing school achievement and an increase in stress and mental illness among Swedish adolescents. This alarming situation may now exacerbate by changed learning conditions as well as psychosocial and economic consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic during 2020/2021. Moreover, to date there are almost no studies in Sweden on how Swedish adolescents have experienced the earlier grading in grade 6 that was introduced in 2012/2013 and the long-term consequences of early grading on their motivation to learn, mental health and future school achievements. How this situation has evolved along with the long-term consequences of Covid-19 is unknown. In addition, special education support is highly related to learning, school achievement and mental health and thus of crucial importance for the life opportunities of adolescents in need of such support.
Research focus
This project focuses on adolescents who experienced earlier grading in compulsory school and distance learning during upper secondary school due to a Covid-19 outbreak in early 2020/2021, and who graduated when a new survey took place in 2023. The school and life situation of adolescents born in 2004 differ thus in several crucial aspects compared to that of adolescents born in 1998. The project aims to reveal knowledge about these aspects and fill an important knowledge gap regarding the long-term effects of mental health on adolescents’ achievement and consequences for future life opportunities, especially for already vulnerable student groups such as those in need of special education support or from homes with low resources. The general aim of the project is to discern protective factors that offer better school and life opportunities for different groups of adolescents.
Empirical data
The empirical work is based on longitudinal data from a register-based population database (GOLD) and a cohort sequential database with nationally representative samples from seven cohorts (1967 to 2004) who will be followed from compulsory school to further studies or employment. Research questions such as those concerning early grading, mental health and Covid-19 consequences will involve specific cohorts while all cohorts will be involved when it comes to special education support issues.
