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Psychosocial well-being before, during and after the COVID-19 pandemic: a nationwide study of more than half a million Norwegian adolescents

Nature Mental Health volume 1, pages 501–513 (2023)Cite this article

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Abstract

Research indicates that the COVID-19 pandemic has had adverse effects on adolescent psychosocial well-being, but little is known as to whether these changes persisted after pandemic-related restrictions were lifted. Addressing this issue, we examined whether declines in well-being remained after the pandemic and whether adverse changes during and after the pandemic varied according to parental socioeconomic status and adolescents’ sex and age. We used data from more than 500,000 Norwegian adolescents, assessed annually between 2014 and 2022. Multilevel analyses showed that after Norway lifted all restrictions, adolescents reported lower satisfaction with peer relationships and less-optimistic future life expectations, but less loneliness compared with long-term trends. Moderation analyses revealed that girls, younger adolescents and adolescents from poor families and with low parental education suffered more adverse changes both during and after the pandemic across several domains. These findings indicate a need for policy interventions targeting social inequalities in adolescent well-being.

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Fig. 1: Societal growth-curve trajectories of adolescent well-being in nine different domains from 2014 to 2022 and estimated effects of the pandemic in 2021 and 2022.
Fig. 2: Estimated effects of the pandemic in 2021 and 2022 according to parental education and perceived family poverty.
Fig. 3: Estimated effects of the pandemic in 2021 and 2022 according to sex and age.

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Data availability

The data that support the findings of this study can be obtained from Norwegian Social Research (NOVA), but restrictions apply to their availability. Parts of the data are publicly available at https://doi.org/10.18712/NSD-NSD3007-V3. The whole dataset used in this study is not publicly accessible and was used under license for the current study. However, it is available upon reasonable request to the corresponding author and with permission of the owner of the dataset, Norwegian Social Research (NOVA).

Code availability

The code for all analyses reported in the manuscript is available at https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/62FAH.

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Acknowledgments

This research has been funded by three grants from the Research Council of Norway (# 288083, 300816 and 301010).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. PROMENTA Research Center, Department of Psychology, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway

    Michal Kozák & Tilmann von Soest

  2. Norwegian Social Research (NOVA), Oslo Metropolitan University, Oslo, Norway

    Anders Bakken & Tilmann von Soest

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  1. Michal Kozák
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Contributions

M.K. and T.v.S. jointly conceptualized the study and drafted the manuscript. M.K. prepared the data and conducted all statistical analyses. A.B. was in charge of the data collection in Ungdata and contributed to writing the manuscript. T.v.S. created the figures. All authors reviewed and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Michal Kozák.

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Nature Mental Health thanks Ezra Susser, Suhaila Ghuloum and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work.

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Kozák, M., Bakken, A. & von Soest, T. Psychosocial well-being before, during and after the COVID-19 pandemic: a nationwide study of more than half a million Norwegian adolescents. Nat. Mental Health 1, 501–513 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44220-023-00088-y

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