The COVID-19 Pandemic and Quality of Life: Experiences Contributing to and Harming the Well-Being of Canadian Children and Adolescents

The pandemic’s restrictive measures such as lockdowns, social distancing, and the wearing of masks transformed young people’s daily lives and brought up major concerns regarding children’s and adolescents’ well-being. This longitudinal mixed study aims to identify how different experiences contributed to children’s and adolescents’ well-being through different stages of the pandemic. The sample comprises 149 Canadian youth from Quebec who shared their experiences of the COVID-19 pandemic. Children and adolescents were met virtually for semi-directed interviews about their well-being at three measurement time (T1: May 2020 lockdown, T2: July 2020 progressive reopening, and T3: beginning of the second wave). At T3, they also completed a questionnaire measuring their quality of life. Our findings indicated that 22% reported a low level of well-being (N: 32), 66% a normal level of well-being (N: 90), and 18% a high level of well-being (N: 27). The comparative thematic analysis of the discourse of these three groups allows us to identify experiences that are favorable and unfavorable to the well-being of young people and to distinguish two configurations of interactions between children and their environment over the first year of the pandemic, namely that of young people who report a high level of well-being and that of those who report a worrying level of well-being. Results highlight the importance of activities, relationships, support, and representations of children and adolescents for their well-being in the pandemic context. Interventions and social measures to better support their well-being are discussed.