Leaving the family home to start university: How is home-leaving related to family environment and attachment?

Abstract

Going to university may entail moving away from home. Leaving the family household is a complex and important stage in the process whereby young people gradually gain independence from their family. The purpose of the present study was to identify different home-leaving profiles at the start of university, and analyze how they are related to the family environment (i.e., parents-child and family relationships) and attachment, adopting a person-oriented approach. Our sample consisted of 1,142 emerging adults who had just started university (70.67% females; Mage = 18.43 years, SDage = 0.57). Latent class and cluster analyses highlighted diversity in home-leaving, family environment, and attachment profiles. Participants with the independent home-leaving profile frequently returned to the family household. There were no family environment profiles with mixed scores. Participants with insecure attachment profiles had higher levels of anxiety compared with those reported in previous studies. A configural frequency analysis revealed three typical patterns and one antitypical one. Semi-independent home-leaving was linked to a supportive and positive family environment and to secure attachment, whereas both co-resident and independent home-leaving patterns were related to unsupportive, controlling, and conflictual family environment and to anxious attachment. Overall, these findings emphasize the specificity of the context of going to university and provide meaningful knowledge about the independence of emerging adult students.