Since completing his PhD in epidemiology in 2005, Julian has worked in research in medicine, social science and education. Julian started working with the Oxford Education Department in 2015, and has worked on a number of educational research projects, including the SEED study of the impact of Early Childhood Education and Care ECEC) on children’s later socio-emotional and educational development and the ROUTES study of the educational progress of looked after children in England.
A particular interest is the definition of child disadvantage and how disadvantage impacts children’s development and educational progress. Current work interests include the Observing Language Pedagogy study and work analysing children’s self-regulation, including the impact of the COVID pandemic on self-regulation and executive function.
Selected publications
Lindorff, A., Malmberg, L., Gardiner, J., Sin Hang Law, N., Ma, Y. Effects of EEF interventions on protection from COVID-19 learning loss: A secondary analysis of data from the EEF Data Archive, EEF, (forthcoming).
Melhuish, E., Gardiner, J. The impact of non-economic and economic disadvantage in pre-school children in England. NESTA, 2024.
Ereky-Stevens, K., Melhuish, E., Gardiner, J., Barnes, J. et. al., Individual, family and neighbourhood factors related to life satisfaction and perceived discrimination among low-income, non-immigrant mothers in seven European countries. Journal of Family Studies 2024. 30(3) pp 397-414.
Melhuish, E., Gardiner, J. Equal Hours? The impact of hours spent in early years provision on children’s outcomes at age five, by socio-economic background. Sutton Trust, 2023.
Siraj, I., Melhuish, E. C., Howard, S. J., Neilsen-Hewett, C., Kingston, D., De Rosnay, M., Huang, R., Gardiner, J. and Luu, B., Improving Quality of Teaching and Child Development: A Randomised Controlled Trial of the Leadership for Learning Intervention in Pre-schools. Frontiers in Psychology, 2023. DOI 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.1092284.
Mathers, S., Malmberg, L.-E., Lindorff, A., Gardiner, J. Early Educators’ Knowledge of Early Language Pedagogy: How can it be measured and does it matter for child language outcomes? Nuffield Foundation, 2022.
Melhuish, E., Gardiner, J. Study of Early Education and Development (SEED): Impact Study on Early Education Use and Child Outcomes up to age seven years. Department for Education, 2021.
Gardiner, J., Oben, J. and Sutcliffe, A. Obesity as a driver of international differences in COVID-19 death rates. Diabetes, Obesity and Metabolism, 2021. 23(7): 1463-1470.
Melhuish, E., Barnes, J., Gardiner, J., Siraj, I., Sammons, P., Sylva, K. and Taggart. B. A Study of the Long-Term Influence of Early Childhood Education and Care on the Risk for Developing Special Educational Needs. Exceptionality Education International, 2019. 29: 22-41.
Gardiner, J., Bolton, C., Sutcliffe, A. G., Melhuish, E. The Educational Progress of Children in Out of Home Care in the UK, in McNamara, P., Montserrat, C. and Wise, S. (eds), Education in out of home care: International perspectives on policy practice and research, Springer, 2019.
Melhuish, E. and Gardiner, J. Structural Factors and Policy Change as Related to the Quality of Early Childhood Education and Care for 3–4 Year Olds in the UK, Frontiers in Education, 2019. 4(35): doi: 10.3389/feduc.2019.00035.
Gardiner, J., Sutcliffe, A. G., Melhuish, E. and Barnes, J. Paternal Age, Paternal Presence and Children’s Health: An Observational Study. Pediatr Rep, 2015. 7(1): p. 5659.
Barnes, J., Gardiner, J., Sutcliffe, A. and Melhuish, E. The parenting of preschool children by older mothers in the United Kingdom. European Journal of Developmental Psychology, 2014. 11(4), p. 397-419.
Sutcliffe, A. G., Barnes, J., Belsky, J., Gardiner, J. and Melhuish, E. The health and development of children born to older mothers in the United Kingdom: observational study using longitudinal cohort data. BMJ, 2012. 345: p. e5116.