Covid-19

The Understanding Society COVID-19 survey allows researchers to explore how the pandemic impacted individuals, families and communities across the UK through our large and representative sample of the UK population.

COVID-19 dashboard

Who has been affected by the pandemic? Use this tool to build charts to show trends over time and to compare different population groups. The dashboard uses variables from the Understanding Society COVID-19 study

Visit COVID-19 dashboard

The COVID-19 survey

From April 2020 participants from our main Understanding Society sample were asked to complete a short web-survey. This survey covered the changing impact of the pandemic on the welfare of UK individuals, families and wider communities. Participants completed a regular survey, which included core content designed to track changes, alongside rotating content adapted each wave as the coronavirus situation developed. There was a telephone version of the survey in some waves for participants unable to take part online.

The COVID-19 study was funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and the Health Foundation. Fieldwork for the web surveys was carried out by Ipsos MORI; fieldwork for the phone surveys by Kantar. Both agencies have conducted the COVID-19 youth surveys.

COVID-19 datasets

Data from the COVID-19 survey is available from the UK Data Service. If you have a question about using the COVID-19 dataset please contact our user support team.

You can find the Understanding Society COVID-19 dataset, Study Number 8644 here.

Special Licence data

Special Licence datasets are available:

Questionnaire content

The COVID-19 survey has the core modules:

Household composition
Coronavirus illness
Long-term health conditions management
GHQ
Loneliness
Employment

Plus rotating content on a wide range of topics. The questionnaires can be found here. You can find the content for the survey in the long-term content plan.