Investigating how critical transitions and events in children's lives affect their social and emotional development from the early years onwards

儿童的生活经历了许多过渡性的经历和事件，这些经历和事件可能对他们的社会和情感发展产生重要的持久影响。加深对儿童发展与这些关键事件之间关系的理解，将为促进苏格兰儿童更好的福祉、社会和情感结果提供必要的知识。将采用纵向分析方法，从早期开始收集和调查这些经验，以研究任何长期影响。提出的主要调查方法是对来自“苏格兰成长”项目的纵向数据进行定量分析。自2005年以来，该数据集一直通过记录健康指标来提供有关儿童发展的证据，使其成为关于发展变量长期影响的理想信息，因为对一些参与者来说，变化将能够被追踪超过十年。以前的学术研究使用在苏格兰长大的数据是非常庞大的，包括但当然不限于，发表的专题报告：公共卫生；城市景观;社会经济的不平等;以及家庭暴力对儿童健康的影响。本项目将以社会政策与社会工作领域的学术研究为基础，形成理论基础，并塑造研究的分析方向。解决儿童发展过程中的不平等现象及其恶化问题是支持该项目的主要动机。因此，研究设计和分析将采用社会正义取向，以期产生有利于积极社会变革的知识，并使各种背景的儿童受益。跨学科的方向和定量方法的使用使这个项目对社会和情感发展问题产生了独特的视角。定量方法的优势在于能够利用广泛的数据，并从苏格兰各地的儿童中汲取联系。受试者的多样性也意味着可能选择的独立变量进行调查是巨大的。纵向数据分析的创新方法将被整合到该项目设计中，目的是建立对过渡如何影响未来福祉的整体理解。例如，在童年后期，健康结果的早期迹象可能会减少或恶化，这取决于它们与过渡事件和各种环境的相互作用。研究将在认识到其研究结果的政策含义的情况下进行，并希望有助于对话，并与之前的苏格兰成长报告和相关的跨学科儿童健康文献协同工作。本课题的实际应用十分广泛。我完成这项研究的首要动机是，为苏格兰政策制定者和其他非政府儿童福利利益相关者（例如慈善部门）提供知识，以制定能够解决长期社会分层问题的政策。对儿童早期事件（如关键转变）如何影响社会和情感发展的强有力的整体理解，将为干预措施在哪些方面可能对消除不平等和不利的发展结果产生最积极的影响提供指示。我希望作为这个项目的一部分，致力于项目成果的公共沟通和教育，以弥合研究参与者和研究结果接受者之间的差距。除了这个项目的直接贡献之外，我希望探索纵向数据集的创造性分析方法，并进一步发展先进的定量方法，这些方法可以应用于未来的研究方法。

Children's lives go through many transitional experiences and events which may contribute important lasting influences on their social and emotional development. Increased understanding of the relationship between childhood development and these critical events will provide essential knowledge for fostering better wellbeing, and social and emotional outcomes for children in Scotland. A longitudinal analysis approach will be used to capture and investigate these experiences from the early years onwards to study any long-term effects. The primary investigative methods proposed is a quantitative analysis of longitudinal data from the 'Growing Up in Scotland' project. This dataset has been generating evidence about children's development by documenting wellbeing markers since 2005, making it an ideal informant about the long-term impacts of developmental variables because changes will be able to be tracked for over a decade for some participants. Previous scholarship using Growing Up in Scotland data is exceedingly vast including, but certainly not limited to, reports published featuring topics of: public health; urban landscapes; socioeconomic inequalities; and the impacts of domestic abuse on childhood wellbeing. This project will build upon scholarship in the fields of Social Policy and Social Work to form the theoretical groundings and shape the analytical directions of the research. Tackling inequalities and their exacerbations throughout childhood development is a primary motivation underpinning the project. Therefore, a social justice orientation will be applied to research design and analysis in hopes of producing knowledge productive to positive societal change and to benefit children from all backgrounds. The interdisciplinary orientation and use of quantitative methods positions this project to produce a unique perspective on questions of social and emotional development. Quantitative methods provides the advantage of being able to utilise a large breadth of data and draw connections from children all across Scotland. The diversity of subject participants also means that the possible selection of independent variables to investigate is vast. Innovative approaches to longitudinal data analysis will be integrated into this project design, with the purpose of establishing a holistic understanding of how transitions affect future wellbeing. For example, how early indications of wellbeing outcomes may be lessened or worsened throughout later childhood depending on their interactions with transitional events and various environments. Research would be conducted cognisant of the policy implications of its findings, and hopefully contributing to the conversation and working in concert with both previous Growing Up in Scotland reports and related interdisciplinary childhood wellbeing literature. Practical applications resulting from this research topic abound.Paramount to my motivation for its completion is to produce knowledge that informs Scottish policymakers and other non-governmental childhood wellbeing stakeholders - for example, the charity sector - to shape policy capable of tackling long-term social stratification. Robust holistic understanding of how early childhood events, like critical transitions, affect social and emotional development will provide indications for where interventions may produce the most positive impacts for combating inequalities and adverse developmental outcomes. I am hoping as part of this project to work on public communication and education about project outcomes to bridge the gap between research participants and the recipients of its findings. Beyond the direct contributions of this project, I hope to explore creative analytical approaches to longitudinal datasets and to further the development of advanced quantitative methodologies which can be applied to future research approaches.