Prof Cat Davies

A sharp tap usually does it for me. Only needed to ask a neighbour once or twice 🙏

Funders’ self-analysis is building better research culture - Research Professional News Internal metascience is helping make scholarship fairer and more open, say Catherine Davies and colleagues

Research funders using metaresearch to monitor and improve their policies and processes and their analytical and experimental capabilities to optimise the research base. Our piece in @resprofnews.bsky.social following our panel at #metascience2025

www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-euro...

Transcript of Module 8 Public Hearing on 30 September 2025 UK Covid-19 Inquiry Archives Transcript of Module 8 Public Hearing on 30 September 2025

My written report and hearing transcript are at: covid19.public-inquiry.uk/documents/tr...

Hearing recording (day 2, 4:42-6:53): covid19.public-inquiry.uk/hearings/chi... (/end)

🫶 Keeping essential services open, such as early years education, health visiting, and safeguarding, with protected funding, access to PPE, testing, and ventilation
💰 Enhanced support for the most socioeconomically, developmentally, and clinically vulnerable families. (10/)

In the event of a future pandemic or comparable national emergency, we recommend:

📊 Balancing the risk of infection against the risk to children’s welfare and development, monitoring metrics for both and adjusting policies accordingly (9/)

❤️‍🩹 Funding long-term research into children’s development after the pandemic. (8/)

❤️‍🩹 Equal access to high-quality early education, supported by a professionalised early education workforce (7/)

❤️‍🩹 A long-term cross-government early years strategy backed by sufficient, secure funding, effectively targeting the social determinants of educational inequalities (6/)

To help children and families recover from the long, inequitable shadow of Covid-19, we recommend:

❤️‍🩹 Targeted, integrated support for the communities hit hardest, e.g. for socioemotional development and early speech, language, and communication (5/)

We need to think differently about the under-fives due to their vulnerability to the environment, dependency on adults and quality interactions, and their critical window for development. (4/)

This was due to multiple, simultaneous risks, including social isolation, stress at home, and restrictions to children’s services such as early education, health visiting, and social care – services which were already under extreme pressure before the pandemic. (3/)

Covid-19 restrictions had significant, quantifiable, and lasting detriments on the development of the youngest and most vulnerable children, and intensified attainment gaps between advantaged and disadvantaged groups in the UK. (2/)

Yesterday I gave oral evidence at the @ukcovid-19inquiry.bsky.social, based on our report 'Little Lives, Big Changes: How Covid-19 Shaped Early Years Services and Children’s Development from Birth to Five Years'. (1/11)

What *is* metascience? Issues, inclusion and future public value - Warren's blog: Publics, politics, science and technology This week, the biennial Metascience Conference came to London’s “Knowledge Quarter” with around 800 participants from a wide range of roles, including researchers, librarians, research funders, publis...

After two really enjoyable days at #Metascience2025, I wrote about how one 🌶️ moment encapsulated the controversy over metascience's issues 📑, inclusivity 🤗and future public value 🔮 #STS #AcademicSky

All feedback welcome on here, or by email 😀

warrenpearce.pika.page/posts/what-i...

As people working in research, I'd argue that it's literally our job to critically analyse the field; to acknowledge and challenge power imbalances. The critical should be inherent in the movement/ self-styled discourse coalition. 2/2

Thanks for amplifying this tension, apparently realised starkly on day 2 (I'd left just before). Along these lines, the session on critical metascience on day 1 was great but inadvertently set out a simplistic dichotomy of pro/anti MS (as called out by @cjcontarino.bsky.social). 1/2

Two hemispheres: Metascience vs Research Culture Just back from Metascience2025 in London, its fourth global gathering and the first outside of the US (held online in 2021). 830 participants representing 65 countries, some better acclimatised to the...

I had a thoroughly lovely time at #Metascience2025 but was struck by the lack of explicit mention of research culture or environment. What gives? And what’s the difference anyhow? Some train-journey thoughts on the symbiosis between metaresearch and research culture. www.linkedin.com/pulse/two-he...

Good news at last for early years support | Letter Letter: Dr Catherine Davies celebrates government funding for nurseries in England’s schools

My letter outlining some of the essential underpinnings of the rollout of 300 new nurseries as part of the opportunity mission:
✔️Workforce professionalisation
✔️Family engagement
✔️Research-to-policy routes, including a dedicated scientific advisory committee.

www.theguardian.com/education/20...

Plus ickle.leeds.ac.uk looked at kids transitioning from YR to Y1 in 2020

Babylab - Social Distancing and Development The effects of social distancing policies on children’s language development, sleep and executive functions.

The SDDS project may also be of interest babylab.brookes.ac.uk/research/soc...

Hi Jenny, sorry to come to this late. The @bicycle-study.bsky.social is looking at the cognitive and language skills of kids both before, during, and after lockdown bornincovidyear.co.uk Happy to discuss our work!

Not just a retrospective, the programme scrutinises the continuing difficulties in accessing support services, and the widening of attainment gaps between advantaged kids and their disadvantaged peers.

Hugely relevant TV. (/end)

Frontline professionals and families speak to the role of early education in children’s lives: their social, emotional, and language development, and the importance of family engagement in school. It highlights the deprioritisation of children’s wellbeing in policy decisions through Covid-19. (4/)

It's a well-produced overview of longer-term effects of lockdown on the youngest in society, with insights from former children's commissioner Anne Longfield, Bridget Phillipson, and other policymakers. (3/)

Tonight’s Panorama looks at how kids who spent their early years in lockdowns are doing now. Some amazing children, families, teachers, as well as us researchers contributed to this edition. (2/)

Panorama - Lockdown Kids: Five Years On Branwen Jeffreys meets with families and teachers to find out how they are helping some of the youngest children impacted by lockdown to catch up on their education and social development.

Five years ago lockdown was coming, and families with kids facing what would be months of juggling work, family and illness, homeschooling, screens, and (at my homeschool at least) epic amounts of rolling around on the floor. (1/).

www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/epis...

The practicalities of a partial lottery to allocate research funding Abstract. This article explores the practical dimension of organizing a partial lottery as an alternative funding allocation mechanism in academic institut

Shoutout to this how-to paper, which is a nice complement to our own: van der Meer et al. (2024) The practicalities of a partial lottery to allocate research funding, Research Evaluation, rvae023, doi.org/10.1093/rese... (4/4)

Main take-home for me was the need to share insights on the existing role of chance in traditional approaches to funding allocation, and to promote the benefits that randomisation affords, e.g. the increased diversity of applicants evidenced by @britishacademy.bsky.social in their trial of PR. (3/4)

Re spoiler in the title, our participants were split on their attitudes: while some appreciated innovation in funding processes, others felt that randomisation was unfair or overly blunt. (2/4)

Sceptics and champions: participant insights on the use of partial randomization to allocate research culture funding Abstract. As part of the shift towards a more equitable research culture, funders are reconsidering traditional approaches to peer review. In doing so, the

New paper, in which we report on our trial of partially randomised internal allocation of Research England funding at @universityofleeds.bsky.social (1/4)
academic.oup.com/rev/article/...