Baseline and Post-intervention Data for Community-based Intervention to Improve Psychosocial Well-being in Left Behind Children in Two Chinese Provinces, 2015-2018

The data collection provides baseline and post-intervention data for a community-based intervention aiming to improve psychosocial outcomes in rural children. The collection comprises the following: 1) Baseline data for children aged 8 to 15 in 20 villages in 3 counties in Zhejiang Province in Eastern China, and in 20 villages in 2 counties in Guizhou Province in south-western China. Questionnaires were distributed by researchers in the classroom setting in villages and townships. Data were collected in early 2015 in Zhejiang and late 2015 in Guizhou. Data include left behind children (LBC, living with neither parent), Single Children (SC, children living with one parent) and Rural Children (RC, children living with both parents). Data includes sociodemographic, economic, psychosocial, emotional and behavioural variables. The psychosocial and emotional variables draw on the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire. There are data for 3796 children in total: 1560(41%) in Zhejiang and 2236 (59%) in Guizhou; 1553 (41%) living with neither parent, 868 (23%) SC living with one parent, and 1378 (36%) living with both parents. 2) Post-intervention data for children in Zhejiang (n=335) who had attended the centres at least 30% of the time over a one year period and controls (n=100) matched by village. Data includes sociodemographic, economic, psychosocial, emotional and behavioural variables. Data collection took place in early 2017. 3) Post-intervention data for children in Guizhou (n=474) who had attended the centres at least 30% of the time over a one year period. and controls (n=100) matched by village. Data includes sociodemographic, economic, psychosocial, emotional and behavioural variables. Data collection took place in 2018. 4) Post-intervention interview recordings with children who attended the centres (in Chinese). 5) Interviews with parents of attending children (in Chinese).