News

New research co-authored by Jorden Jackson shows that armed conflict and extreme heat can compound one another’s effects on child health across sub-Saharan Africa.

A new international study published in the International Journal of Epidemiology, co-led by RMIT researcher Dr Lauren Steele and LCDS researcher Dr Andrea Tilstra, examines how mortality risks varied by age across four major influenza pandemics (1918, 1957, 1968, and 2009), drawing on mortality data from 48 populations. 

Researchers at the University of Oxford are launching a a major new initiative to understand how people across the UK feel about their communities, institutions, and the future of the country.

A new study led by LCDS researcher Dr Ursula Gazeley has uncovered the substantial but largely invisible burden of violent deaths during pregnancy and the postpartum period in Mexico, showing how definitions of maternal mortality shape which women’s deaths are counted, and which are left out of official statistics.

A new Comment article published in Nature Human Behaviour warns that social science and behavioural genetics (SBG) stands “at a critical juncture” as concerns grow over the misuse of genetic research, the rise of commercial embryo selection for IQ and other mental-behavioural traits, and renewed interest in race-based genetic analyses.

Researchers from the Leverhulme Centre for Demographic Science had an exceptionally successful presence at the 2026 Annual Meeting of the Population Association of America in St Louis, with multiple award-winning presentations highlighting the breadth and impact of demographic research at LCDS.

We are pleased to welcome Sebastián Villamizar Santamaría, editor at Nature Cities, for an upcoming LCDS seminar on publishing social science research within the Nature Portfolio family of journals. The seminar will take place in the Butler Room at Nuffield college from 14:00-15:30.

Each year, the Leverhulme Centre for Demographic Science (LCDS) is proud to bring a wide range of innovative research to the Population Association of America (PAA) Annual Meeting. At PAA 2026 in St. Louis, LCDS researchers contribute through presentations, posters, and professional service across key areas including mortality, health inequalities, fertility, gender, labour markets, and social mobility.

Demographic projections are central to understanding how populations evolve and to planning for the future. Governments, international organisations, and researchers rely on forecasts of fertility, mortality, and migration to anticipate demand for schools, healthcare systems, housing, and pensions. Yet producing reliable projections remains a complex task. Population processes are shaped by changing social norms, economic conditions, and individual decision-making, all of which introduce uncertainty and make it difficult to capture future trends accurately.