Learning from the trajectories of mental health challenges for children, young people and parents over the course of the Covid-19 pandemic

新冠肺炎和相关公共卫生措施已经给家庭生活带来了重大破坏，随着时间的推移，儿童、年轻人和他们的家庭面临着不同的压力。英国的Co-Space项目和日本的Corona-CODOMO(C-C)项目是两项全国性的在线调查研究，追踪自疫情开始以来儿童、年轻人和父母受到的影响。这两项研究分别发现，封锁和学校停课与年轻人和父母的心理健康恶化和压力增加有关。某些群体(例如，有经济困难的家庭和有特殊教育需要的儿童)在整个大流行期间似乎特别容易受到压力增加和精神健康症状的影响。然而，在这一点上，我们仍然不知道如何最好地支持摆脱新冠肺炎大流行的家庭，特别是不同国家和大流行背景下的需求可能会如何不同。拟议的项目建立在现有成功合作的基础上，将进一步利用国际数据分析、文本挖掘方法、患者和公众参与以及将研究转化为实践方面的现有专业知识。反过来，它将促进知识交流和早期职业研究人员的参与。这项建议的目的是：(I)利用从这些平行的国际调查中可以学到的关于新冠肺炎的影响以及各国如何管理它的经验；(Ii)进一步了解这一流行病对年轻人和父母的心理健康症状以及他们的康复途径的中长期影响；(3)与青年和家庭一起，为决策者和卫生当局共同设计指导方针，这将有助于减轻这一流行病和现行政策所确定的中长期精神健康后果，并调整未来的大流行病管理战略，以尽量减少对青年和家庭的精神健康影响。上述目标将通过三个工作流程实现，同时在整个研究生命周期中积极让两国的青年和家长参与决策：(1)将已收集的在线调查(包括横断面)数据合并，并使用多层次建模方法进行分析，以研究如何立即对儿童、青年、日本和英国的父母因新冠肺炎疫情的政策和限制，以及孩子、家庭和其他关键特征而有所不同；(2)将在两国使用时间序列和文本挖掘方法进行三次每6个月一次的跟踪调查，并使用类似措施进行分析，以检查谁正在和没有‘反弹’，以及这一流行病的中长期后果是什么；(3)通过一系列在线活动，我们将与领导人解锁合作，共同为两国的政策制定者和实践者设计指导方针，这是一个使年轻人和代表性不足的群体能够就这一问题发表意见的组织。

COVID-19 and the related public health measures have led to major disruptions to families' lives, with different pressures arising for children, young people, and their families over time. The Co-SPACE project in the UK and CORONA-CODOMO (C-C) project in Japan are two nation-wide online survey-based studies tracking how children, young people, and parents have been affected since the start of the pandemic. Both studies, separately, have found that lockdowns and school closures were associated with deteriorating mental health and increased stress in young people and parents. Certain groups (e.g., families with financial difficulties, and with children with special education needs) appear to have been particularly vulnerable to elevated stress and mental health symptoms throughout the pandemic. However, at this point, we still know little about how to best support families coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic and, in particular, how needs may vary across countries and pandemic-contexts.The proposed project builds on a successful existing collaboration that will further utilize available expertise in international data analysis, text-mining approaches, patient and public involvement, and translating research into practice. In turn, it will promote knowledge exchange and involvement of early career researchers. The aim of this proposal is to: (i) capitalise on what can be learned from these parallel international surveys about the impact of COVID-19 and how it has been managed across countries; (ii) develop a further understanding of medium and long-term impacts of the pandemic on the mental health symptoms of young people and parents, as well as their pathways to recovery; and (iii) together with young people and families, co-design guidelines for policy makers and health authorities, which will help to mitigate identified medium to long-term mental health consequences of the pandemic and current policies and to tailor future pandemic management strategies to minimise mental health impacts on young people and families.The above aims will be achieved through three workstreams, while actively engaging young people and parents from both countries in decision making throughout the research lifecycle:(1) The already collected online survey (including cross-sectional) data will be merged and analysed using a multi-level modelling approach to examine how immediate mental health consequences for children, young people, and parents across Japan and the UK have varied over the COVID-19 pandemic according to policies and restrictions, as well as child, family, and other key characteristics; (2) Three 6-monthly follow-up surveys with comparable measures will be conducted and analysed using time series and text-mining approaches across both countries to examine who is and is not 'bouncing back' and what are the medium and long-term consequences of the pandemic; (3) Through a series of online events, we will co-design guidance for policy makers and practitioners with young people from both countries in collaboration with the Leaders Unlocked, an organisation which enables young people and underrepresented groups to have a voice on issues that matter.