Dr Patricio Troncoso

Research Associate

Affiliations:

Overview

I'm currently a Research Fellow in the Manchester Institute of Education, working on the Good Behaviour Game randomised controlled trial. My research interests are mainly within the broad areas of Statistics, Sociology and Education. I have conducted research on the effects of socio-economic inequalities on educational outcomes, such as pupils' progress and school value-added, as well as on the often overlooked non-educational outcomes, such as pupils' anxiety, depression and worry.

I hold a PhD in Social Statistics from the University of Manchester and my background is in Sociology and Public Policy (especially education policy). I previously held a lectureship in Social Statistics, where I taught a variety of courses on quantitative research methods and statistics at the undergraduate and postgraduate level, including Survey Methods, Regression, Multilevel Modelling, Longitudinal Analysis, Demography and R statistical software.

I have participated in several projects at the Manchester Institute of Education (MIE), the Cathie Marsh Institute for Social Research (CMI) and the UK Data Service (UKDS). I have also worked alongside UK government policy-makers and analysts at the Department for Education (DfE) to explore issues around child protection services. My work at the DfE helped policy-makers and other stakeholders to gain a better understanding of the factors contributing to long-term repeated referrals to child services. This work gathered the attention of the media, NGO’s, as well as local governments and the Parliament, where some of the outcomes of this research were discussed.

My own current research involves a cross-country longitudinal comparison of the differential effects of socio-economic background and parenting on several early-life outcomes of children, with a focus on overall development and health, cognitive abilities, social and emotional learning and educational outcomes.