Adolescent Intergenerational Cohesiveness and Young Adult Proximity to Parents

• In Event: 463 - Regular Session. Intergenerational Relationship in the United States

Abstract

This paper considers how parent-child cohesion in adolescence relates to young adults’ geographic proximity to parents. Using the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 (N = 2,736), ordered probit models the association between adolescents’ emotional closeness to parents and subsequent residential distance, controlling for key factors. Young people “at risk” of living at a distance (i.e., who have moved out of the parental home) may be characterized by poorer relationships with parents. To take account of potential selection bias, two-stage Heckit models address spatial proximity as it relates to the choice to live with parents. At least for mothers, emotional closeness is robustly associated with later spatial proximity. The finding holds controlling for family structure, which is often taken as proxy for relationship quality. Although emotional closeness figures in the decision to leave home, we do not find that selection out of coresidence biases the results for geographic proximity.

Authors

• Brian Joseph Gillespie, Sonoma State University

• Judith Treas, University of California-Irvine