How Far from the Nest? Race, Gender, and Economic Differences in Family Residential Proximity

• In Event: 381 - Section on the Sociology of the Family Refereed Roundtable Session and Business Meeting
  In Refereed Roundtable 60min: Table 03. Family Relationships

Abstract

This paper focuses on an understudied dimension of the residential attainment process: the spatial proximity to family. There are a variety of theoretical reasons to believe that proximity to family may vary systematically across core dimensions of social stratification. This paper employs zero inflated negative binomial modeling techniques and data from the 1997 and 1999 waves of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics to investigate group differences in family proximity. I find that such differences occur primarily in terms of residence in the same neighborhood. For example, African American adult children are significantly more likely than their white counterparts to live in the same census tract as their parents. Conditional on not sharing the same neighborhood, the spatial proximity of adult children and parents is less predictable. This analysis suggests systematic variation in the way family influences the spatial distribution of population.

Author

• Aaron J. Howell, SUNY - Farmingdale