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<p>The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated a pre-existing global crisis in adolescent mental health, with government-mandated school closures disrupting the social and emotional development of millions. This study investigates the causal impact of these policies on students’ sense of school belonging, a critical determinant of well-being, within the under-researched context of eight post-Soviet countries. A quasi-experimental Difference-in-Differences (DiD) design was employed, using nationally representative data from the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) for 112,272 students in 2018 (pre-pandemic) and 2022 (post-pandemic). The study critically examines the sensitivity of causal estimates to the policy’s operational definition by testing two distinct measures of school closure duration: a simplistic measure based only on <i>full</i> closures and a comprehensive measure accounting for the <i>total</i> duration of educational disruption (full and partial closures). The analysis reveals a stark methodological sensitivity. A simplistic definition of school closures produced a counter-intuitive and misleading positive effect on school belonging. In contrast, the comprehensive definition accounting for total disruption revealed a statistically significant negative causal effect. Prolonged educational disruption suppressed the post-pandemic recovery of students’ sense of school belonging by approximately 0.086 standard deviations (B=−0.086, p&lt;.001). This study provides robust causal evidence that prolonged school closures inflicted significant social costs on adolescents by hindering their integration into the school community. More importantly, it demonstrates that the validity of policy evaluation is critically dependent on the precise and context-aware operationalization of the intervention. These findings underscore the need for policymakers to consider the severe social-emotional consequences of disconnecting students from school and for researchers to exercise caution in defining policy variables in causal analyses.</p>

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The Impact of COVID-19 School Closures on Student Belonging: a Difference-in-Differences (DiD) Analysis

  • 期刊论文

  • 发表日期：

    2026年2月13日

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  • Askhat Makhmetov

摘要

The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated a pre-existing global crisis in adolescent mental health, with government-mandated school closures disrupting the social and emotional development of millions. This study investigates the causal impact of these policies on students’ sense of school belonging, a critical determinant of well-being, within the under-researched context of eight post-Soviet countries. A quasi-experimental Difference-in-Differences (DiD) design was employed, using nationally representative data from the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) for 112,272 students in 2018 (pre-pandemic) and 2022 (post-pandemic). The study critically examines the sensitivity of causal estimates to the policy’s operational definition by testing two distinct measures of school closure duration: a simplistic measure based only on full closures and a comprehensive measure accounting for the total duration of educational disruption (full and partial closures). The analysis reveals a stark methodological sensitivity. A simplistic definition of school closures produced a counter-intuitive and misleading positive effect on school belonging. In contrast, the comprehensive definition accounting for total disruption revealed a statistically significant negative causal effect. Prolonged educational disruption suppressed the post-pandemic recovery of students’ sense of school belonging by approximately 0.086 standard deviations (B=−0.086, p<.001). This study provides robust causal evidence that prolonged school closures inflicted significant social costs on adolescents by hindering their integration into the school community. More importantly, it demonstrates that the validity of policy evaluation is critically dependent on the precise and context-aware operationalization of the intervention. These findings underscore the need for policymakers to consider the severe social-emotional consequences of disconnecting students from school and for researchers to exercise caution in defining policy variables in causal analyses.