Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Reposted by Understanding Society

Jonathan Burton @jonburton.bsky.social · 8d

Childcare more common in higher income families.

Welsh Government uses @usociety.bsky.social to investigate childcare and effects on children

www.understandingsociety.ac.uk/impact/welsh...

Childcare more common in higher income families - Understanding Society

Reposted by Understanding Society

Jonathan Burton @jonburton.bsky.social · 8d

New User Guide for @usociety.bsky.social with information on the geographical identifiers and geographical classifications datasets available in Understanding Society and provides information on how they can be used.

www.understandingsociety.ac.uk/documentatio...

1 3

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 8d

A new example of Understanding Society’s impact is up on our website today: the Welsh Government has used Understanding Society to investigate childcare and its effects on children

Welsh Government uses Understanding Society to investigate childcare and effects on children Welsh Government research investigates childcare effects on children using Understanding Society data

Introduction to Path and Mediation Analysis with R - Longitudinal Analysis

Reposted by Understanding Society

LongitudinalAnalysis.com @longdata.bsky.social · 9d

🔍 Curious about path analysis and mediation analysis?
I just published a beginner-friendly guide with diagrams + R code examples.

👉 Learn how to separate direct, indirect, and total effects.

Read here: longitudinalanalysis.com/introduction... @usociety.bsky.social @esrasurvey.bsky.social

Introduction to path analysis and mediation analysis in R. Estimate direct, indirect, and total effects with diagrams, examples, and code.

longitudinalanalysis.com

2 4

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 9d

A new edition of the Pregnancy and Early Childhood (PEACH) datafile has been released.
Bringing together info on pregnancy and early childhood, the file can be linked to the main UKHLS dataset to look at a range of child development and family topics.
www.understandingsociety.ac.uk/news/2025/09...

New edition of the PEACH datafile - Understanding Society

The latest Pregnancy and Early Childhood data is now available from the UK Data Service The latest Pregnancy and Early Childhood data is now available from the UK Data Service.

Is there a trade-off between diversity and social cohesion? - Understanding Society

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

There is more detail in Wing’s blog, in which he says “Every time we have looked at the issue, we have found that it’s material deprivation, not social diversity, that threatens to stretch and tear the social fabric”

Material deprivation, not social diversity, threatens to stretch and tear the social fabric diversity and social cohesion

2

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

This research also shows that an increase in diversity was associated with a fall in social cohesion, but only before taking deprivation into account. When the analysis included deprivation, once again the link between diversity and lack of cohesion disappeared

1 2

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

A forthcoming paper used British Household Panel Study data (1991-2009), and found an overwhelming majority of respondents liked their neighbourhood: 90% said so in Wave 1, 93% in Wave 11, and 94% in Wave 18 – exactly at the time when Britain was getting more diverse

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

Once that is considered, the negative link between diversity and social cohesion disappears. Or, to put it another way: correlation does not equal causation. If diverse neighbourhoods appear less cohesive, it’s because they tend to be more deprived

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

Whichever diversity measures they used, and however they defined neighbourhoods, people living in more diverse areas tended to report lower levels of generalised trust, and hold more negative views about their neighbours and neighbourhood – but only *before* taking material deprivation into account

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

They took factors such as sex, age, marital status, employment, and social class into account – but also local deprivation, measured by unemployment in an area, and households that didn’t own a car, or their own home, or were overcrowded

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

Wing and Juta Kawalerowicz used Understanding Society to look at measures such as local friendships, a sense of belonging, and how close-knit the neighbourhood is – and they used four different measures of social diversity, and two definitions of neighbourhood

Ethnic Diversity and Social Trust - Peter Thisted Dinesen, Kim Mannemar Sønderskov, 2015

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

And what is a neighbourhood? One paper looking at Denmark found “ethnic diversity in the micro-context [within a radius of 80 to 180 metres] affects trust negatively” – but is an area as small as that really a neighbourhood? The paper adds: “the effect vanishes in larger contextual units”

We argue that residential exposure to ethnic diversity reduces social trust. Previous within-country analyses of the relationship between contextual ethnic dive...

doi.org

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

One problem is the fractionalisation index used to measure diversity – it’s ‘colour-blind. A neighbourhood which is 80% White and 20% Black will have the same fractionalisation score as one that is 20% White and 80% Black. But these will clearly be very different neighbourhoods

Ethnic Diversity and Its Effects on Social Cohesion | Annual Reviews

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

One review of 90 papers on the link between ethnic diversity and social cohesion found that 26 supported the constrict theory, 25 contradicted it, and 39 had mixed results. (Another, looking at 87 papers, says “few clear answers have been reached”)

Recent years have seen a sharp increase in empirical studies on the constrict claim: the hypothesized detrimental effect of ethnic diversity on most if not all aspects of social cohesion. Studies have...

doi.org

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

But Professor Tak Wing Chan @ioe.bsky.social gave a keynote speech at the Understanding Society conference in July asking if there really is a trade-off between diversity and social cohesion. He’s used longitudinal data to test existing research

Is Britain becoming too diverse to sustain the mutual obligations behind a good society and the welfare state?

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

Eric Kaufman’s book White Shift says “more diversity equals less solidarity”, and David Goodhart has written: “sharing and solidarity can conflict with diversity”

Too diverse?

www.prospectmagazine.co.uk

Ballymena: Disorder after alleged sex assault 'racist, pure and simple' - say police

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

When there were riots in Northern Ireland in June, politicians condemned “pure racism”, and called the events a “pogrom”. One, though, said the violence “distracts from the very real grievances” about “rapid demographic change”

Houses and police vehicles were damaged in the disorder in Ballymena on Monday evening.

www.bbc.co.uk

This Commons Library briefing paper is a guide to understanding UK migration statistics. It explains the concepts and methods used in measuring migration and sets out a range of data on migration in t...

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 14d

A 🧵 on the timely issue of diversity and social cohesion: immigration is a perennial hot topic, and the latest figures show “the number of people migrating to the UK has been greater than the number emigrating in each year since 1994”

Migration statistics

commonslibrary.parliament.uk

1 2 4

Reposted by Understanding Society

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 23d

...or let your ears do the work and listen to our new podcast episode (but admire the cat, too, obviously)

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · Sep 8

Our podcast is back from its summer break! Our new episode has Adelina Gschwandtner @kent.ac.uk and Ashleigh Brown from RSPCA discussing pets and life satisfaction, and how it’s possible to work out a monetary value for the benefits we get from cats and dogs

Pets and life satisfaction - Understanding Society

Can we put a monetary value on what pets bring to our lives?

Wellbeing boost from disability benefits outweighs cost - Understanding Society

2 2

Reposted by Understanding Society

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 23d

…or our newest ‘explainer’ case study

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 27d

New case study! Charity @pbe.co.uk used our data to show that the £28 billion annual bill for disability benefits creates £42bn in positive effects

Wellbeing boost from disability benefits worth £12,300 per person New case study shows wellbeing boost from disability benefits worth £12,300 per person

Is there a trade-off between diversity and social cohesion? - Understanding Society

1 2 3

Reposted by Understanding Society

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 23d

If you’re looking for some lunchtime reading, you could try our latest blog post…

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 23d

New blog: Tak Wing Chan @ioe.bsky.social with a detailed look at immigration and social cohesion. Pundits and some research tell us that diversity undermines trust and solidarity, but can we accept findings which don’t take poverty and inequality into account?

Material deprivation, not social diversity, threatens to stretch and tear the social fabric diversity and social cohesion

A methylome-wide association study of major depression with out-of-sample case–control classification and trans-ancestry comparison - Nature Mental Health

1 1 2

Reposted by Understanding Society

Anna Dearman @annadearman.bsky.social · 22d

It was great to contribute to this study for @usociety.bsky.social on the epigenetic correlates of major depression, and to be listed alongside such incredible co-authors!
www.nature.com/articles/s44...

The authors report a meta-analysis of methylome-wide association studies, identifying 15 significant CpG sites linked to major depression, revealing associations with inflammatory markers and suggesti...

www.nature.com

1 2

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · 23d

...or let your ears do the work and listen to our new podcast episode (but admire the cat, too, obviously)

Understanding Society @usociety.bsky.social · Sep 8

Our podcast is back from its summer break! Our new episode has Adelina Gschwandtner @kent.ac.uk and Ashleigh Brown from RSPCA discussing pets and life satisfaction, and how it’s possible to work out a monetary value for the benefits we get from cats and dogs

Pets and life satisfaction - Understanding Society

Can we put a monetary value on what pets bring to our lives?