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The British Household Panel Study (BHPS) is a longitudinal survey that has followed a representative sample of individuals since the early 1990s. The resource is used routinely by government departments (e.g. DWP, HMRC, Cabinet Office) and third-sector bodies (e.g. Children's Society) for their research and for monitoring progress towards policy targets. The data's longitudinal character has helped to transform government departments' understanding of the goals of social policies, and allowed them to redefine targets in ways not possible without the BHPS. Examples include DWP's monitoring of persistent poverty, which uses BHPS data to estimate the probability of an individual living in poverty for several successive years.
Social pensions targeting poor households have emerged as a major anti-poverty policy for developing countries. Since 2008, programmes have been established or extended in Bangladesh, Mexico, Peru, Uganda and the Philippines. Collectively, these programmes provide regular cash payments to at least six million households not previously covered by formal social protection. DEV research significantly contributed to this by (i) raising awareness of social pensions among NGOs, UN agencies and key policy makers; (ii) providing robust evidence of the effects of existing social pension programmes; and (iii) more recently, identifying limitations of existing schemes and the need for complementary interventions.
Members of Loughborough University's Helpline Research Unit (LUHRU) have been researching, evaluating and advising on helpline services since 2000. LUHRU research on the exchange of talk between callers and call-takers on telephone helplines has had a significant impact on helpline training and quality control, benefitting helpline organisations, call-takers, and users. The impact has been realised through a) engagement activities that have increased understanding of helpline interactions amongst managers and call-takers, b) training and development activities that have changed call-takers' practices, and c) consultation and evaluations that have changed organisational policy and practice.
McNay's work is at the boundaries between HEIs and their environment: policy analysis, particularly of Access and, here, Research Quality Assessment, and the impact on internal strategies; and organisational analysis and the way internal cultures and processes are conditioned by external influences. His conceptual model of cultures is used by professionals worldwide to evaluate and improve leadership and management and introduce change. RAE impact analysis has influenced policy (eg on the teaching /research nexus) in the UK and elsewhere) and staff behaviour. It was a factor leading to adjustment of later exercises towards profiling, consistency of criteria and impact
The impact that the Communication Research Centre at Loughborough University (LCRC) is claiming is raised awareness and understanding of the media's representation of two socially significant topics: general elections in the UK, and government policy on drug usage. The former analyses have led to repeated commissions, and the latter proved central to the UK Drug Policy Commission's report to government, and its recommendations to combat negative stereotyping of users.
EUROMOD, a tax-benefit microsimulation model developed at Essex, has been used by the European Commission and various national administrations to improve the evidence base for policymaking. EUROMOD enables the measurement of potential effects of policy changes on government budgets, income distribution, and work incentives in the EU. It is used by the European Commission to inform policymaking and model the outcome of austerity measures. At a national level it has been used by the Greek Government to assess the potential impact of various austerity policies, and the Austrian Government to assist in monitoring the effect of policies on meeting poverty reduction targets and to allow the public to understand the impact of policy changes. EUROMOD has also been adapted for use outside the EU and spin-offs have been developed in Serbia and South Africa that are used to model the outcomes of potential policy developments.
The Compulsive Exercise Test (CET) and Loughborough Eating disorders Activity Programme (LEAP) are the world's first clinical assessment tool and intervention designed to assess and treat compulsive exercise among eating disorder patients. These advances have changed the way in which services now assess their patients and deliver treatment. They are currently in use by in excess of 52 specialist eating disorder services globally, including the vast majority of specialist services in the UK (a minimum of 520 patients treated to date). As well as delivering an assessment tool and manual, the impact also includes training of circa 600 clinicians and sports specialists.
The O4O action research project generated positive impacts for older people living in some of Europe's most remote and rural areas. It helped to shift perceptions of older people as a burden on society and towards recognition of the value they can bring to their communities as well as their potential to be involved in services design and delivery. The project underpinned the development of several older people's services that have generated employment opportunities and health/wellbeing improvement. The project challenged some of the assumptions in social enterprise/co-production policy and helped to identify the types of support that older people, and rural communities more widely, may need in order to develop their own service delivery organisations. O4O was recognised by the European Commission (EC) for its contribution to addressing the challenge of demographic change and supporting active aging.