Kids' Environment and Health Cohort [CAG Pilot]
Research type
Research Database
IRAS ID
318257
Contact name
Pia Hardelid
Contact email
Research summary
Kids' Environment and Health Cohort
REC name
London - City & East Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
23/LO/0472
Date of REC Opinion
9 Jun 2023
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion
Data collection arrangements
We are setting up a new data resource called Kids, Environment and Health Cohort for England to allow researchers to study the link between environments in and around schools and homes, and children’s health and education. Children are much more vulnerable to health-damaging features of the environment in and around their homes and schools than adults. Being exposed to such things as outdoor air pollution, overcrowding, mould in the home, fast food advertising near schools, or having no access to greenspace during childhood is associated with the development of long-term conditions such as asthma, poor mental health, obesity and worse educational attainment. The Kids' Environment and Health Cohort will be used to explore these effects.
Data for children will be linked to information about their mothers’ health during pregnancy. We will combine the health and education data in the Kids' Environment and Health Cohort with data on local environments in and around children’s homes and schools. This will allow researchers to carry out studies of how factors such as living near busy roads, growing up in an overcrowded house, or having access to parks and local services influence children’s health and schooling from birth to teen age. To show how the Cohort data can be used, we will carry out a study to look at whether living or going to school near greenspace (such as public parks or gardens) helps teenagers’ mental health, and whether living in areas with good childcare provision is related to how well children do at school.
Research programme
The Kids' Environment and Health Cohort will hold a range of information about children and their mothers during pregnancy, linked to data about the environment. Researchers can use this data to a answer a wide range of topics and research questions about how the local environment influences children's health and education. These can include things such as how children’s neighborhood influence their educational attainment or how local air pollution may be linked with health outcomes in children’s future. By creating a national data resource that a wide range of researchers can access, our aim is to help create new evidence on the beneficial and harmful aspects of children’s social and physical environments where they are growing up. This evidence can then be used parents, teachers, scientists and politicians to try and improve and fix some of these influences that may be harming the development of young people. This is how the KITE database will support and help communities in the future, helping to create more equal and healthy neighborhoods.
Research database title
Kids' Environment and Health Cohort
Establishment organisation
University College London
Establishment organisation address
30 Guilford Street
London
WC1N 1EH