Cohort Profile: UK Millennium Cohort Study (MCS)

Abstract

The UK Millennium Cohort Study (MCS) is an observational, multidisciplinary cohort study that was set up to follow the lives of children born at the turn of the new century. The MCS is nationally representative and 18 552 families (18 827 children) were recruited to the cohort in the first sweep. There have currently been five main sweeps of data collection, at ages 9 months and 3, 5, 7 and 11 years. A further sweep of data collection is planned for age 14 years. A range of health-related data have been collected as well as measures concerning child development, cognitive ability and educational attainment. The data also include a wealth of information describing the social, economic and demographic characteristics of the cohort members and their families. In addition, the MCS data have been linked to administrative data resources including health records. The MCS provides a unique and valuable resource for the analysis of health outcomes and health inequalities. The MCS data are freely available to bona fide researchers under standard access conditions via the UK Data Service (http://ukdataservice.ac.uk) and the MCS website provides detailed information on the study (http://www.cls.ioe.ac.uk/mcs).

Family structure and socio-emotional wellbeing in the early years: a life course approach

“…We analysed data for a further three sweeps when the children were aged 3 (MCS2), 5 (MCS3) and 7 (MCS4) years. More information on the MCS is reported elsewhere (Connelly & Platt, 2014;Hansen, 2014).…”

The Millennium Cohort Study: the making of a multi-purpose resource for social science and policy

“…Some of them are described by Connelly and Platt (2014) and others are ongoing. Though their story is not told here, both types of enhancement add greatly to the wealth and complexity of this multi-faceted asset.…”

“…We have not revisited the epidemiological material reviewed by Connelly and Platt (2014). Neither have we elaborated on the teacher surveys, mentioned in table 1.…”

“…The scale of the resource and its variety means that a complete story would extend well beyond the scope of a single article. Indeed a profile of the Millennium Cohort (MCS) up to its fifth sweep at age 11 has already been published, focussing on its potential use for epidemiological research (Connelly & Platt, 2014). The aim of this article is to explain to potential users how the objectives, structure and content of the study were shaped by the history of its forerunners in previous British cohorts and by the context of its funding.…”

Are the differences in adulthood ill-health across the north-south divide and between Scotland and England also evident in early childhood health indicators?

“…Respondents were the biological mothers of singleton children enrolled in the Millennium Cohort Study (MCS), a nationally representative birth cohort study of children born across the UK in the year 2000 (see cohort profile by Connelly & Platt, 2014). The present study is concerned with data collected in waves 1 (baseline) and 2 (second stage of data collection) of the MCS in England and Scotland when the cohort child was aged nine months and three years respectively.…”