UBelong Longitudinal Data, 2023-2025

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The U-Belong dataset comprises longitudinal survey data collected as part of the UK MRC–funded U-Belong project, which investigates students’ social belonging, social connection, and mental health in UK higher education. The dataset includes repeated observations from undergraduate and postgraduate students recruited from a large UK university across two academic years (2023–2024 and 2024–2025), with baseline and follow-up survey waves enabling within-person longitudinal analyses. The survey captures a rich set of constructs spanning social, psychological, and contextual domains. Core measures include students’ expectations and experiences of social connection, perceived mismatches between expectations and experiences, sense of belonging, social connectedness, engagement with university life, community connection, comfort with solitude, and experiences of everyday discrimination. Loneliness is assessed using multiple approaches, including the De Jong Gierveld Loneliness Scale, the UCLA Loneliness Scale, and a direct loneliness item. Mental health and wellbeing measures include validated assessments of anxiety, depression, mental wellbeing, and general wellbeing, alongside social anxiety, social avoidance, alcohol consumption, and peer pressure. The dataset also includes detailed social network data collected using both aggregate network indicators and a brief egocentric “mini-network” module, as well as measures of social support, social media use and experiences, and academic and financial pressures. Extensive demographic, educational, and identity-related variables are provided, including age, sex, gender identity, sexual and romantic orientation, ethnicity, religion, disability status, migration status, caring responsibilities, first-generation student status, international student status, commuter status, care experience, and socioeconomic background. Information on course of study, prior educational experiences, and living arrangements is also included. Participants are linked across waves using anonymised participant identifiers. The data are fully anonymised and accompanied by detailed documentation, including a comprehensive codebook describing variable construction, scales used, and wave availability. The dataset is suitable for secondary analyses examining social belonging, loneliness, mental health, inequalities, and student experiences in higher education, as well as for methodological work on longitudinal survey design and social network measurement.

Loneliness is linked to poor mental health and reduced educational achievement and social mobility. It is often thought of as something experienced by the elderly. However, loneliness is a growing concern among university students. Recent studies have found that young people report high levels of loneliness. This seems puzzling. University students are surrounded by peers. They often live with friends and have many opportunities to socialise. Why would they feel lonely? Addressing this question, we will develop the concept of loneliness. We will work with young people to represent the adolescent experience accurately and sensitively. We will work with students across the project, making co-creation a priority. We will identify opportunities to reduce loneliness in university students. There are 1.7million adolescents in UK universities. As many in 2 in 5 students may meet criteria for mental illness. Increasingly, this is a cause for concern. Universities are looking for ways to support student mental health. Students are at a developmental transition and experience dramatic changes in social networks, creating risk for loneliness. However, if properly understood, loneliness may be reduced, providing a target to boost mental health and educational achievement. New interventions depend on a strong theoretical framework and researchers need suitable tools to measure loneliness. We can all describe loneliness. The COVID-19 lockdowns gave many people new insights into the experience of loneliness. However, understanding of the concept, especially in young people, is limited. Historical analysis can help. We will explore when and how the idea of university as a social experience emerged. This will provide a broader social and cultural context to understand loneliness. We will make it easier to measure loneliness sensitively. Loneliness is often assessed using a single question: "how often do you feel lonely?" This cannot identify differences in origin or experience. It does not capture how loneliness relates to social connection, sense of belonging or expectations. We will investigate these links and develop new tools to allow differences in loneliness to be understood. We will look at how social contacts change as young people move to university and ask if these changes cause loneliness. To do this, we will make use of the rich, but under-used, Social Network Analysis. Because this approach is under-used, we will develop simplified resources to help the others capture key insights in surveys. We will develop a new measurement tool to assess expectations of social connection. We will use this to identify differences in student's expectations for social connection and ask how these expectations impact the experience of loneliness. Students often describe belonging as the opposite of loneliness. Do students lack a of sense of belonging? Does this drive loneliness? We will test whether a sense of belonging helps us understand loneliness, over and above social networks and expectations for social connection. We will explore how the group dynamics that support a sense of belonging, especially for minority groups, may influence loneliness. Social identity influences our sense of belonging. Therefore, in looking at belonging, as well as social connection and expectations, the diversity of the student population is key. Across our research we aim to understand the broad diversity of student experience and how this shapes differences in the experience of loneliness. We will develop a rich and detailed theoretical framework for loneliness. We will test whether there are different types of loneliness and examine how diverse social identities shape the experience of loneliness. The project will develop new tools to facilitate future research into loneliness. Through prioritising co-creation, we will address barriers to engagement and create resources and guidance to accelerate student involvement in research.