Life with Corona focuses on understanding how the spread of the Coronavirus influences the lives of those who, both directly and indirectly, experience the pandemic. What challenges have you faced during the pandemic? What have you done to cope with the challenges that have arisen? How are you feeling? And what do you think of the society you live in, and its response to the crisis? Life with Corona is a multi-topic survey that is designed to hear stories from as many people as possible, and to aggregate these stories into lessons about four main domains: The challenges and difficulties people face because of the pandemic. The practices and behaviours they have taken to in order to mitigate the pandemic, or at least to cope with it. The impact of the pandemic on personal and economic wellbeing. And its role in shaping how we perceive the societies we live in and how cohesive those societies are.

1. Challenges: Have you been ill? Do you know someone has? Have you struggled to find goods and foods that you’ve never struggled to find before? And if so, how has all of this affected how you feel? This component of the survey wants to understand how you, personally, have experienced the pandemic; to define the challenges that you are experiencing; and to understand whether or not other people like you are experiencing the same challenges. 

2. Practices: How did you respond to the pandemic? What changed for you? Did you carry on as normal – going to the office, or the park, for example? Were you an early adopter of regular hand-washing? Who decided to stay at home? Who didn’t? And why did different people respond so differently? Are early and late adopters of new behaviours the same as each other? There are no right answers to these questions. Rather, this part of the survey wants to understand how you, and people like you, have updated what they do, and where possible, the reasons why.

3. Wellbeing: The message is clear: we are living in an unprecedented time. People are asked to stay at home. For some, this makes it difficult to juggle childcare. For others, it might mean that they no longer have a job to go to. Either way, there is no doubt that such major disruption will have impacts on the wellbeing and emotional health of all of us living through this pandemic – not just those of us unfortunate enough to fall ill or to experience the loss of loved ones. How are you feeling? What are you worried about? And how do you think this will be in the weeks and months to come? This part of the survey wants to know how you are feeling and dealing with these times.

4. Social Cohesion: Has your government done the right things during the pandemic? Do you trust them to do the right things in the future? What about your neighbours? How are you getting along with your family; or the friends you share your home with? And how are these relationships influencing other things, like your emotions or wellbeing? Are tensions in your home affecting your satisfaction with life? Or have you been heartened by the nice things you’ve seen your neighbours and friends do? This part of the survey wants to understand how you perceive the society in which you live in the context of the pandemic; and in the context of the world that emerges after the pandemic has ended.