Dr Liming Li is an Affiliated Lecturer within the Sociology Department. She currently holds a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellowship based at the Department of Global Health & Social Medicine, King's College London. Liming studied Sociology and obtained her PhD in 2020 from the Department of Sociology, University of Cambridge.
Research Interests
Liming’s research focuses on how public policies shape people’s life chances and contribute to inequalities of health. Her topics of interests include work and employment, ageing, child development, intergenerational transfer, mental health, and public policy evaluation.
Liming currently works on the British Academy funded project ‘Understanding the impact of higher education expansion policy on women’s empowerment’. This project examines the impact of policies that expanded women’s access to higher education on their sense of empowerment, using quantitative (quasi-experimental) and qualitative methods.
Previously, Liming worked on the ESRC-funded programme 'Work, welfare reform and mental health', which looked at welfare reforms, work, employment, and their mental health implications in the context of the UK. She also worked on the EU-funded project 'MINDMAP: promoting mental wellbeing in the ageing urban population: determinants, policies and interventions in European cities'.
Research Projects
Do mental health support policies improve the wellbeing of adopted children? Quasi-experimental evidence from the UK (first author, accepted for oral presentation by the Population Association of American 2024 conference)
Employment transition and mental health of the self-employed: evidence from the UK (first author, accepted for oral presentation by the Population Association of American Applied Demography Conference 2024)
Does higher education matter to happy-ever-after in marriage? A natural experiment in China (first author, accepted for poster presentation by the Population Association of American 2024 conference)
Teaching
Causal Inference Methods (SSRMP module convening)
Quantitative Research Design & Analysis in Education & Policy Research (SSRMP module convening)
Social Theory (SOC2 supervision)
Global Social Problems (SOC3 supervision)
Publications
Li L. et al., 2023. Has the UK Campaign to end loneliness reduced loneliness and improved mental health in older age? A difference-in-differences design. The American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jagp.2023.10.007
Li, L. and Avendano, M., 2023. Lone parents' employment policy and adolescents’ socioemotional development: Quasi-experimental evidence from a UK reform. Social Science & Medicine, 320, p.115754. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2023.115754
Li, L. et al., 2021. Aircraft noise control policy and mental health: a natural experiment based on the Longitudinal Aging Study Amsterdam (LASA). J Epidemiol Community Health, 75(5), pp.458-463. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/jech-2020-214264
Li, L. 2023. Does claiming welfare benefit by single mothers benefit their children’s mental health? UK Data Service Data Impact Blog series: https://blog.ukdataservice.ac.uk/welfare-benefit-single-mothers/
Grants and Projects
Understanding the impact of higher education expansion policy on women’s empowerment (2023-26); Funded by the British Academy; Principal Investigator: Dr Liming Li
Looked-after children: impact of thenAdoption Support Fund and mental wellbeing in British adoptive families’ (2021-22); Funded by What Works for Children’s Social Care (1188350); Principal Investigator: Dr Liming Li
