Evidence

The Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Centre (PEC) has published a paper that provides an up-to-date picture of workforce demographics in the creative industries. The report, Getting in and getting on: Class, participation and job quality in the UK's Creative Industries, identifies and develops upon five key facts:

The Wellcome Trust is funding a network of longitudinal studies on the global mental health impact of Covid-19, led by an international steering group of scientists and mental health professionals.

COVID-Minds links together studies from countries around the world, supporting the sharing of protocols and data, the harmonisation of mental health measures, and the dissemination of findings to policy-makers and health bodies.

The network will collate empirical research on mental health as it is published and send fortnightly newsletters to help researchers stay up to date.

The National Campaign for the Arts (NCA) has launched its new Arts Index, a snapshot report of the health of England’s arts and culture. The latest edition covers ten years of austerity and reveals how the arts sector’s entrepreneurial response to a decade of decline in public funding, philanthropy and business support is now the very thing that threatens its future.

The report’s key findings include:

Canterbury Christ Church University’s Sidney De Haan Research Centre for Arts and Health has launched a national survey on the measures taken by Singing for Health Groups and Community Choirs to keep singing during the lockdown. The study is gathering information on how online platforms like Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Google Hangouts have been used to help them continue their work. 

Singing for Health Groups and Community Choirs provide valuable support to those with long-term health conditions and those with a history of mental health challenges.

A study aimed at understanding the impact of Covid-19 on adult behaviours which contribute most to avoidable deaths in the UK has been launched by the UCL Department of Behavioural Science & Health and the UCL Centre for Behaviour Change. The survey, produced in collaboration with Action on Smoking and Health, Public Health England and Cancer Research UK, examines how the coronavirus pandemic has affected adult tobacco use, nicotine use (vaping), exercise, diet and alcohol use.

The World Health Organisation has released a report consolidating global evidence on the role of the arts in improving health and wellbeing, with a particular focus on the WHO European Region

64 Million Artists, the organisation behind The January Challenge, have revealed the clinical research results into their online creativity projects

King’s College London and UCL have launched the world’s largest ever study into the impact and scalability of arts interventions on physical and mental health

The University of Florida’s Center for Arts in Medicine and ArtPlace America has released the white paper, Creating Healthy Communities through Cross-sector Collaboration

From 2020, the Baring Foundation will change the theme for its arts funding from arts and older people to arts and mental health. This year the Foundation wants to explore the state of the field throughout the UK, and next January will publish a scoping / mapping study to launch its new programme (drawing on the model of 2009's Ageing Artfully).