The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of rapid, high quality survey data to understand the impact of disasters and to inform policy and service responses.
Moreover, increases in the frequency and severity of natural disasters are likely under most climate change scenarios meaning that citizens in many countries will be exposed to many natural disasters over their life course.
In this presentation, Ben Edwards (Australian National University) will discuss some of the approaches taken in a series of research studies from the 2007 Millennium Drought in Australia, to a national cohort study of children in the Philippines, and the 2019-20 bushfires in Australia.
Ben will reflect on recent developments in tracking changes in policy responses to the pandemic through his role as leading the subnational data collection of the Oxford Government Response Tracker in Australia and the ongoing role of social surveys to understand the impacts of natural disasters.
About the speaker
Associate Professor Ben Edwards is a Senior Fellow at the Australian National University Centre for Social Research and Methods, where he is focused on policy relevant research on child and youth development.
He is an expert in longitudinal studies of child and youth development, linkage of administrative data to surveys and longitudinal studies of disadvantaged groups such as refugees.
His substantive research examines the implications of natural disasters for children and youth, evaluating programs focussed on enhancing children's development (e.g. preschool, childcare, place based initiatives), and intergenerational impacts of trauma (refugees, Vietnam war).
He is Co-Editor of the Australian Journal of Social Issues, Project Director of the Australian subnational data collection of the Oxford Government Response Tracker and led the collection of the Australian Social Survey International -ESS (AUSSI-ESS).
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