Clear Skies, Clear Minds: Air quality and children’s welfare

This project will investigate the impact of air pollution on children’s health and educational outcomes in England since the early 2000s.

Why this project is important

Air pollution has severe implications for cardio-respiratory health and the brain. Children are at higher risk of ill effects due to their smaller developing respiratory tracts, higher relative air intake, and greater amount of time spent outdoors. Poor physical health resulting from air pollution can affect cognitive functioning and academic performance, which in turn may affect a child’s mental health.

What the research will involve

The project team aim to provide crucial insights into how pollution exposure affects children’s development by addressing two research questions:

1. What are the short- and medium-term effects of air pollution on children’s educational attainment, physical health and mental health, and how do these effects reinforce each other?
2. Does the quality of public services and amenities in a neighbourhood mediate these effects?

Temporal and spatial variation will be exploited to measure the causal impacts of changes in air pollution associated with industrial plants, airports, and maritime ports. Data on children’s outcomes will be sourced from the new ECHILD dataset, which integrates education and health records for approximately 20 million children in England aged 2-16. Differences by length and age of exposure, and the potential for outcomes to recover once exposure is reduced, will also be explored. The potential mitigating effect of neighbourhood characteristics will be investigated by linking data on education, health, and pollution with deprivation scores and information on house sale and rental prices and school and healthcare service quality.

How the research will make a difference

The findings will be instrumental for understanding how societal transformations, like the net-zero agenda, are shaping the futures of children across England through changes in local pollution, and for informing strategies to mitigate its detrimental effects. Project outputs will include a series of policy briefs and interactive maps.