Dr Yanan Zhang

Research Associate

Yanan was a quantitative postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Social Policy, Sociology and Criminology at University of Birmingham. She joined the Sustainable Care programme in August 2018 as a Research Fellow in the “Modelling Care System Costs and Contributions: data for a sustainable care and wellbeing strategy” package which is led by Dr Matthew Bennett and Professor Janet Fast.

She was previously a Research Fellow for the West Midlands Leadership Commission where she collected evidence and conducted empirical analysis for the West Midlands Combined Authority Leadership Commission Report on the leadership diversity gap. The report was commended by the Prime Minister, Theresa May. She completed her PhD in May of 2018 at the University of Birmingham where she was supervised by Professors Alessandra Guariglia and David Dickinson. Her thesis explored the association between savings and ageing populations, household composition and consumption, and health care systems in China.


Research and publications

Caring and COVID-19’, Sustainable Care CARE MATTERS series of reports in partnership with Carers UK:

GLASBY, J., ZHANG, Y., BENNETT, M., & HALL, P. (2020). A lost decade? A renewed case for adult social care reform in England. Journal of Social Policy, 1-32. doi:10.1017/S0047279420000288

Zhang, Y., Bennett, M. R., and Yeandle, S. (2019) “Will I Care: The Likelihood of Being a Carer in Adult Life.” London: Carers UK.