COVID-19 Early Years Resilience and Impact Survey (CEYRIS) report
Are the kids alright? Key messages from the third round of the Public Health Scotland COVID-19 Early Years Resilience and Impact Survey

About this release

In January 2022, we release a series of data reports presenting the findings from the third round of the COVID-19 Early Years Resilience and Impact Survey (CEYRIS). This briefing paper presents the key messages from the third round of the survey, and where appropriate, describes trends from the previous two rounds.

Key messages are presented for the following themes:

• Child's emotions and wellbeing
• Child's interactions with others
• Bereavement
• Child's play and activities
• Greenspace and outdoor access
• Childcare and education settings
• Parental wellbeing, concerns, and challenges.

We also highlight the presence of prominent income-related inequalities throughout the findings.

Main points

• Overall, the findings suggest that for a substantial proportion of children in our sample, parents and carers perceive the pandemic to have had a negative impact on child and family health, wellbeing and development.
• The impacts generally appear to be felt to a greater extent in families from low-income households, who may have already been struggling before the pandemic.
• The impacts do not appear to be universal, areas that some families report as having a negative impact, others report as having a positive impact.
• There are areas where the perceived impacts tend to be positive, rather than negative, and these should not be overlooked.
• There are areas where further analysis would be beneficial, which will be presented in future publications.

Background

The COVID-19 Early Years Resilience and Impact Survey (CEYRIS) is an anonymous, cross-sectional survey administered online. PHS developed the survey to address a gap in the evidence base about wider impacts of the pandemic on young children and their families in Scotland. To date, there have been three rounds of the survey completed. Round 1 in June/July 2020, Round 2 in November/December 2020 and Round 3 in September/October 2021.

View the findings from all three rounds.

NHS Performs

A selection of information from this publication is included in NHS Performs. NHS Performs is a website that brings together a range of information on how hospitals and NHS Boards within NHSScotland are performing.