Childhood and Adolescent Mobility and Adult Relations With Parents

Abstract

This study addresses three questions: Does earlier family mobility have long-term effects on later parent-adult offspring relations? Do differences in parenting behaviors and family social capital account for these effects? Does the family structure in which a move occurs matter? The author investigates these issues using 17-year longitudinal data from two generations. The results suggest that frequency of family mobility has no effects on parent-adult child relations. Instead, it appears that age at mobility matters most. Adult sons who moved during adolescence and during both childhood and adolescence have poorer relationships with their mothers and fathers. Earlier mobility, though, generally has no associations with an adult daughter’s relationship with her parents. For sons and daughters, moves that occur in divorced households are the most difficult on later parent-adult child relations. Some, but not all, of the long-term effects of family mobility are because of differences in parenting between movers and nonmovers.