Organisation/Company Swansea University
Department Central Research
Field Medical sciences » Health sciences
Researcher Profile First Stage Researcher (R1)
Positions PhD Positions
Country United Kingdom
Application Deadline 7 Apr 2025 - 23:59 (Europe/London)
Type of Contract Temporary
Job Status Part-time
Hours Per Week 35
Offer Starting Date 1 Jul 2025
Is the job funded through the EU Research Framework Programme? Not funded by a EU programme
Is the Job related to staff position within a Research Infrastructure? No
Offer Description
This PhD studentship aims to train the successful candidate in public health research methods, health inequalities, epidemiology, and population data science. The student will investigate whether poorer indoor air quality in schools leads to worse asthma and educational outcomes.
This student will also receive supervisory support from the Social & Environmental Determinants of Health Driver Programme and be supported by the recently funded CHILI hub. The CHILI Hub aims to support and improve children’s education as school buildings are being made environmentally sustainable in order to meet the net zero target by 2050. Greater insulation and airtight building designs make buildings more energy efficient, but may also lead to more indoor air pollution becoming trapped, or increasing indoor temperature. Respiratory infections also spread more easily in airtight buildings.
Children and young people spend most of their time in school indoors. The indoor environment at school can support children’s health and their education. Therefore, it is important to examine how the indoor environment in schools can affect children and young people’s health as school buildings are being adapted to meet the net zero target.
Asthma is a chronic respiratory disease with a significant health and economic burden. In Wales, asthma affects about 1 in 11 people. Evidence shows that the most deprived population groups in Wales have higher rates of asthma prevalence, morbidity, and mortality. Socioeconomic deprivation is a multidimensional construct that encompasses various domains, with income and educational inequalities being the key underlying drivers of asthma inequalities in Wales. The student will consider the role of deprivation in any associations seen between indoor air quality in schools and asthma and/or educational outcomes. The student will develop specific research questions early in the studentship.
The student will have access to nation-wide routinely collected data, including primary and secondary care as well as cause of death records. These data will be obtained from the Secure Anonymised Information Linkage (SAIL) databank, a secure, privacy-preserving data infrastructure that integrates a wide range of routinely collected data from across Wales. The student will further link this data to the Welsh Index of Multiple Deprivation (WIMD) - Wales’ multifaceted area-based socioeconomic deprivation index - and modelled air quality data. Further, the studentship will explore the use of Census 2021 individual level data and other deprivation measures, to understand how health inequalities vary at the individual level and household level. In addition, the student will use the Residential Anonymous Linking Field (RALF), an encrypted Unique Property Reference Number (UPRN) which has been used in SAIL since 2012, to enable household level data linkages which will allow examining the intergenerational transmission of socioeconomic inequalities in asthma. RALFs allow the linkage of measures of the built and natural environment (e.g. air pollution, greenspace, housing characteristics, access to services) at high spatial resolution and also facilitate understanding of household composition. This builds on work pioneered in Wales and links to the S&E driver programme.
The student will develop and validate appropriate statistical and data science models to assess the relationship between indoor air quality and asthma and educational outcomes (school attendance, educational attainment). Analysis methods will include multilevel models to account for spatial dependencies.
The student will receive state-of-the-art training to develop their knowledge and skills in epidemiology, population data science, such as data manipulation, modelling, and visualization, and information governance. The student will have the opportunity to engage with stakeholders early in their research to receive feedback on research aims and design and translate their findings into policy and practice.
Minimum Requirements
Applicants for PhD must hold an undergraduate degree at 2.1 level and a master’s degree. Alternatively, applicants with a UK first class honours degree (or Non-UK equivalent as defined by Swansea University) not holding a master’s degree, will be considered on an individual basis.
Candidates with qualifications in mathematics / computer science and a health-related discipline are particularly encouraged to apply, but it would be possible for those with mathematics, physics or other computational training to learn the healthcare context.
Experience in one or more of the following would be desirable:
* Programming in MATLAB/Python/R etc.
* Previous research experience with healthcare datasets or electronic health records.
Scholarship open to UK fee eligible applicants only.
Additional Information
This studentship covers the full cost of tuition fees and an annual stipend at UKRI rate (currently £19,237 for 2024/25).
Additional research expenses will also be available.
Selection Process
Please see our website for more information.
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