ABSTRACT

This paper explores the potential impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on people’s perceptions of cohesion in their local communities; particularly for vulnerable groups/communities, such as ethnic minorities or those living in highly deprived neighbourhoods. To this end, we examine both trends over time in overall levels of cohesion as well as patterns of positive and negative changes experienced by individuals using nationally representative data from Understanding Society Study. We test whether rates of positive-/negative-change in cohesion over the pandemic-period differed across socio-demographic groups and neighbourhood characteristics. These trends are then compared to patterns of positive-/negative-change over time experienced in earlier periods to test whether the pandemic was uniquely harmful. We show that the overall levels of social cohesion are lower in June 2020 compared to all of the examined pre-pandemic periods. The decline of perceived-cohesion is particularly high in the most deprived communities, among certain ethnic minority groups and among the lower-skilled. Our findings suggest that the pandemic put higher strain on social-resources among vulnerable groups and communities, who also experienced more negative changes in other areas of life.

抽象的

本文探讨了Covid-19大流行对人们在当地社区凝聚力感知的潜在影响；特别是针对弱势群体/社区，例如少数民族或生活在高度贫困地区的人。为此，我们使用理解协会的具有全国代表性的数据，考察了整体凝聚力水平随时间的变化趋势以及个人经历的正面和负面变化的模式学习。我们测试了大流行期间内聚力的正/负变化率是否在不同的社会人口学群体和邻里特征之间有所不同。然后将这些趋势与较早时期经历的正/负变化模式进行比较，以检验这种流行病是否具有独特的危害性。我们显示，与所有检查的大流行前时期相比，2020年6月的社会凝聚力总体水平较低。在最贫困的社区，某些少数族裔群体和技能较低的人群中，凝聚力的下降尤为严重。我们的发现表明，大流行对脆弱群体和社区的社会资源造成了更大的压力，这些脆弱群体和社区在生活的其他领域也经历了更多的消极变化。