Figure 1. Study Design.

Top. We first examine whether standard mental health self-assessment measures differed between the period of time just prior to the pandemic hitting the UK and mid-lockdown, and whether those differences covaried with population factors such as age, education and occupational status. We then analyse peoples’ self-perceptions of the impact of the pandemic, determining the internal structure and dimensionality of self-perception, and the covariance with population and contextual and lifestyle factors. Bottom. Timecourse of data collection at the time of submission (note, Y axis is a log scale). Large spikes in data collection occurred in January prior to the pandemic hitting the UK and in May, at the peak of the first UK-wide lockdown. These pre and mid-pandemic epochs form the focus of analyses reported in this article. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.