Housing insecurity experiences and coping strategies of single‐mother families in Australia: An Internet‐mediated research

Abstract

AbstractHousing has broader implications for families. Single mother families face many difficulties that make them more susceptible when encountering housing problems. By analyzing the content of a single mother Facebook group, this article describes a variety of housing insecurity issues experienced by single mother families in Australia, including unaffordable housing, struggles in the private rental market, high mobility, and homelessness. We observed some risk factors and protective factors at both individual level and structural level that intersect and mediate single mother families’ experiences of these housing insecurity issues. A multidimensional framework is applied to analyze the complexity and fluidity of these factors. Psychosocial and group‐based interventions can help single mother families manage stress and improve their adaptation to some housing insecurity issues. However, mountain‐moving efforts to tackle structural problems are central and urgent to address these issues and to support single mothers and their children.