Leaving home in Slovenia: A quantitative exploration of residential independence among young adults

Journal of Adolescence 37 (2014) 1409e1419

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Leaving home in Slovenia: A quantitative exploration of residential independence among young adults Metka Kuhar a, *, Herwig Reiter b a b

University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Social Sciences, Kardeljeva pl. 5, 1000, Ljubljana, Slovenia German Youth Institute, Nockherstr. 2, 81541, München, Gerrmany

a r t i c l e i n f o

a b s t r a c t

Article history: Available online 17 June 2014

The present paper analyzes and contextualizes the phenomenon of prolonged coresidence of parents and young adult children in Slovenia. It analyzes the process of moving out or staying at home on the basis of a subsample of young people between 19 and 29 who are no longer at school included in the representative Slovenian field survey Youth 2010. Young people still living in the household of their parents or (legal) guardians are compared with those who have already left. The analysis considers factors associated with the status transitions from youth to adulthood; the demographic, social and economic background; and the perception of the parentechild relationship quality and parenting style by the children. Our findings point to the importance of possibilities for independent housing and the economic capacity of young people and their family. The most important factor behind moving out seems to be a stable partnership. © 2014 The Foundation for Professionals in Services for Adolescents. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Young people Parents Parenting Housing Extended co-residence

Slovenia e country background and trends in youth transitions Slovenia was one the first countries with a socialist past that joined the European Union in the year 2004. As one of the former Yugoslav republics it also represents the unique case of a Mediterranean country that transformed from state socialism to market society in less than 15 years. The rapid institutional transformation is reflected in some of the countryspecific peculiarities of transitions to adulthood. A first pan-Yugoslav study from the 1980s (Vrcan et al., 1986) indicates that Slovenia used to be the most ‘Western’ country of the socialist bloc: it shared with its capitalist neighbors some societal trends like destandardization, individualization and pluralization as well as aspects of ‘modern youth’. After the breakup of Yugoslavia, Slovenia maintained its special status: it was not affected by ethnic violence and war in the 1990s and soon joined the European Union. During the first years of the transformation, youth transitions to adulthood in Slovenia appeared to be continuously smooth and little affected by the post-socialist institutional revamp. Yet in the years that followed, youth transitions started to be postponed: within the European Union, Slovenia has become one of the countries with the highest average age of young men and women when leaving the parental household (Eurostat, 2009, p. 29). The proportion of young people between 25 and 29 years living in the same household with their mother increased from 44.4% in the year 2000 to 66.2% in 2010 (Lavri c Flere, Tavcar Krajnc et al., 2010b, p. 283). European value surveys from

* Corresponding author. Tel.: þ386 40331978; fax: þ386 15805101. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (M. Kuhar), [email protected] (H. Reiter). http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.adolescence.2014.05.011 0140-1971/© 2014 The Foundation for Professionals in Services for Adolescents. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

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1999 to 2008 indicate that, including those who also live in the same household with their partner/spouse and/or child/ren, up to two thirds of young people between 18 and 34 years continue to live with their parents (see Table 1). These shares used to be much lower during socialism: the Slovenian Public Opinion survey of 1980 indicates that about 40% of the 18e34 age group used to live together with their parents as well as together spouse/partner or/and child; 25% lived with their parents only. Nowadays these shares correspond to the average of the former Yugoslav countries and are considerably higher than in other EU countries. For instance, in the EU 15 little more than one third of the same age group lived with parents in 2008. With regard to the socio-economic context of growing up in Slovenia, extended participation in education, difficulties entering the labor market and the tight housing market are common explanations of young people postponing leaving home. The prolonged stay within the family of origin is first of all an outcome of severe housing shortages that followed the breakdown of Yugoslavia (Mandi c, 2009). The construction and distribution of new dwelling places did not meet the growing demand that could satisfied only temporarily by privatizing public housing. The market for renting is small due to the culture of owning one's residence: after the privatization of the formerly state owned housing, which amounted to more than onethird, some 90% of flats and houses in Slovenia are privately owned (Mandi c, 2007). Especially young adults cannot afford the rising prices of independent housing. Another reason why transitions out of the parental home are ‘frozen’ is related to their extended participation in education (Kuhar & Reiter, 2012). Around 90% of young people remain in education at tertiary levels. In this way, they benefit from many advantages associated with studying like social insurance or tax incentives for student employment, which is increasingly popular and has become a regular form of low-paid employment outside the ‘official’ labor market. This utilitarian approach of combining politically granted advantages of the status of being a student with the benefits of living at home results in long average durations of studies, in high drop-out and low completion rates. The regular Slovenian labor market at the other end of the school-to-work transition is saturated with over- and ill-qualified academics; it holds too few appropriate jobs for the mass of highly-educated university graduates. From 2010 to 2012, the unemployment rate for young people between 25 and 29 years increased from 12.2% to 17.7%; the overall unemployment rate increased from 7.1% to 11.7% and (Statistical Office of the Republic of Slovenia, 2013). All these context factors contribute to the tightening of relationships between parents and children and the extended dependence of children. The majority of young Slovenians perceive family of origin as the most important source of all kinds of support and their reliance on the family is strong and increasing. Research indicates that prolonged co-residence is associated with exceptionally supportive and relatively high quality relationships between parents (especially mothers) and young people (Rener, 2006; Ule & Kuhar, 2003), also in international comparison (Pokrajac, 2006). The majority of young Slovenians appreciate parental emotional and material support while at the same time enjoying personal freedom and independence. Less than one out of five young people indicate that they do not feel good at home or wish for greater parental support (Rener, 2006). The perceived autonomy and comfort of “hotel mama” turns staying at home into a lifestyle of choice (Ule & Kuhar, 2003). This trend is not the same in all former Yugoslav countries. For instance, in Serbia tensions are common despite otherwise very strong intra-family relations (Tomanovic, 2002), and young people express dissatisfaction with paternalizing and infantilizing strategies of parents (Tomanovi c & Ignjatovi c, 2006). The process of residential emancipation of young people is a very important issue at the political level (e.g., the policy document about housing problems of young people, published by the National Youth Council of Slovenia, 2010) as well as in youth research (e.g., Kuhar, 2012; Rener, 1995; 2006; Ule & Kuhar, 2003) and in research on housing (e.g., Mandi c, 2007, 2009; Mandic & Gnidovec, 1999). However, as Kuhar (2012) notes, the question of leaving the family of origin has not yet been comprehensively addressed at the micro level. Compared to other countries, where the issue of leaving home has become an established field of research (Mulder, 2009), there is little knowledge about how the timing of leaving home is affected by various socio-economic, relational and other transitional characteristics in Slovenia. In this article we want to take a step in the direction of understanding the prolonged co-residence of young adult children and their parents through an in-depth analysis of potential determining aspects at the level of individuals. We want to add a logistic regression analysis comprising potential predictors of the living situation of emerging adults in Slovenia available from the study Youth 2010 to the rather descriptive analysis of Lavri c et al. (2010) who cross tabulated residential autonomy of young people from 25 to 29 with ‘still living at home or not’, ‘employment status (of young people)’ and ‘parental ownership of property’. The following part introduces our tentative research hypotheses as well as the data set and method used for the analysis. Then we present and discuss our findings from the descriptive as well as multivariate analyses and reflect how they can inform our understanding of the situation in Slovenia within the Mediterranean context.

Table 1 Percentage of young people living with their parents, % (answers of 18e34 year-olds).

European European European European

Values Values Values Values

Survey, 1999/2001 e with parents, including those with partner/spouse/child Survey, 1999/2001 e with parents only Survey 2008 e with parents, including those with partner/spouse/child Survey 2008 e with parents only

Note. Own calculations.

Slovenia

Ex-yu

EU 15

EU postsoc

64.6 56.8 63.8 53.6

62.3 52.1 69.8 57.4

37.6 36.1 34.0 31.1

47.0 38.0 51.8 42.1

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Determinants of moving out or staying at home In order to complement our knowledge about the influence of contextual factors on leaving home e like the abovediscussed culture of extending education and the problematic labor and housing markets e the purpose of our analysis is to investigate the level of individuals and their family context: what distinguishes young men and women who are still residing in the household of their parents (including legal guardians)? In particular, how are members of these two groups different regarding: (1) gender and other key indicators of their transitions to adulthood; (2) the quality of the relationships between parents and the child in the sense of non-transferable resources as well as the parenting style; and (3) socioeconomic family background in the sense of transferable resources? Although our secondary analysis is mostly explorative we can establish hypotheses based on what we know about the Slovenian case from previous research and empirical evidence regarding this particular transition in other countries. In line with previous research we expect young women to move out earlier than young men. The reasons for this female head start are still unclear and are generally attributed to the earlier maturity of young women. In particular, it may well be linked to ‘advanced-intimacy development’ and ‘earlier romantic involvement’ of young women, as Seiffge-Krenke (2013: 120) notes. The greater importance of family structure and atmosphere for women is, for instance, identified by Buck and Scott (1993), Chiuri and Del Boca (2010), and Mitchell and Wister (1989); it underlines the persistence of traditional gendered role-expectations according to which women leave home at a younger age when they follow their partner. Comparative studies into age norms corroborate the gender difference. For instance, Aassve, Arpino, and Billari (2013, p. 389) find that, regarding perceptions about the maximum acceptable age to live with parents, in Slovenia the mean age deadline for leaving home is at 30.2 years for men and 28.7 for women. Our data do not allow us to observe the accomplishment of developmental tasks directly. Yet we can refer to indicators that are proxies of successful individuation. We analyze the expected positive relationship between age and moving out indirectly and anticipate age-related features like level of education, and having a partner and a job, as well as one's own income, to be important predictors. In terms of income, research indicates that financial resources in the family as well as individual resources of young people have a positive influence on setting up an alternative dwelling place. Unlike high parental income, high levels of personal income of young adults are clearly positively related to moving out (Avery, Goldscheider, & Speare, 1992; Mulder & Clark, 2000). Correspondingly, we also expect the participation in employment to have a positive impact on leaving the parental home. Even if jobs tend to be less and less stable, fixed-term contracts become recognized as “the new normal” and incomegenerating source in the housing market. In general, as long as education is not completed and enrollment ongoing young people have a tendency to stay at home (Mulder, 2009). However, we expect higher levels of completed education to have a positive effect on moving out: advanced educational opportunities are not necessarily available in the vicinity of the parents' home and higher education goes hand in hand with better employment and income opportunities. Young women at least in the last decade in Slovenia on average tend to get higher education levels than young men; yet as they study rather social than technical sciences, their job prospects are nevertheless worse. Therefore we do not expect that the education level or the employment would accelerate leaving home. The significance of close friends and romantic relationships for the timing of leaving home is well-established in research (e.g., Furman & Buhrmester, 1992; Hartup & Stevens, 1997). Seiffge-Krenke (2013) suggests the importance of “romantic careers” and argues that emerging adults are more likely to establish romantic relationships when they already were romantically active during adolescence. German longitudinal studies show that children still living at home at the age of 25 report overall lower rates of romantic involvement at all ages (Seiffge-Krenke, 2010). Following these findings and on the basis of partnership information that is available in our data, we expect young people already living with a partner to do this primarily outside the parental home.

Family background and family relations e transferable and non-transferable resources The family background plays an important role in leaving home with regard to both transferable and non-transferable resources. Research with regard to non-transferable family resources like atmosphere and family climate indicates that prolonged coresidence is more likely to occur in families with positive parentechild relationships (Aquilino, 1997; Aquilino & Supple, 1991; De Jong Gierveld, Liefbroer, & Beekink, 1991; Mitchell & Wister, 1989; Van Hekken, de Mey, & Schulze, 1997). Emerging adults with good relations to their parents are more likely to experience a sense of well-being in the parental home (Lanz & Tagliabue, 2007). This finding is important irrespective of the fact that the relationship between parents and children could further improve by children living independently (Buhl, 2007; Flanagan, Schulenberg, & Fuligni, 1993). In line with these findings we assume that the quality of the relationship between parents and children as well as their approach to parenting have an influence on the decision to remain in or leave the parental home: young adults are more likely to stay when they experience their parents as pleasant companions; children will leave earlier in case the parents are rather authoritarian (in contrast to being authoritative). Blaauboer and Mulder (2010) find that especially young women tend to stay longer when they feel comfortable; thus, we expect that parental non-transferable resources will affect young women more strongly than young men.

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The picture is more ambiguous with regard to transferable resources like parental income, education or property (Aassve, Billari, Mazzuco, & Ongaro, 2002; Avery et al., 1992; Goldscheider & Goldscheider, 1999; Mulder & Hooimeijer, 2002; Whittington & Peters, 1996). Studies usually find that parents' economic resources reduce the likelihood of children leaving home early; yet they have a facilitating effect once the child gets older. On the one hand, parental resources cushion financial constraints and stimulate leaving home. On the other hand, resources may go hand in hand with an all too comfortable home, a so-called “feathered nest” (Avery et al., 1992), which young adults have trouble leaving behind. More recent research indicates that the link between material conditions and leaving home is very complex. For instance, Iacovou's (2010) comparative analysis finds a linear and positive relationship between the material situation of the family of origin and the age of leaving home first of all in the countries of Northern and Western Europe, while it is the other way around in the southeastern and some eastern European countries. Against this background, we cannot formulate a directional hypothesis for Slovenia; yet we expect the influence of the material status of the family to be significant. Research indicates that the impact of transferable resources differs according to gender. For the Netherlands, findings by Mulder and Hooimeijer (2002) suggest that men are more affected by their fathers' socio-economic status than women (also Mulder & Hooimeijer, 2002). Buck and Scott (1993) for the United States and Aassve et al. (2002) for several European countries report a positive effect of parental income only for males. A negative atmosphere or lack of resources, on the other hand, might push young adults out of their parental home into early cohabitation or living on their own. At later ages, apparently particularly women tend to rely on parental resources when making the transition out of the parental home. However, there is evidence that this is different in Mediterranean countries where daughters seem to leave earlier and sons stay when families dispose of greater resources (Chiuri & Del Boca, 2010). Finally, transferable resources of the family of origin can materialize in homeownership. Although this can foster the “feathered-nest phenomenon”, research indicates that it has a differential impact on leaving home. For Germany and the United States, Mulder and Hooimeijer (2002) find a positive effect of parental homeownership on children leaving home in order to live with a partner; in this case, parental homeownership refers to resources within the family that enable young couples to afford a suitable, possibly owner-occupied property. Parental homeownership can have a moderating effect on leaving home in case the alternative would be living without a partner; in this case, for many young people the parental ‘feathered nest’ appears to be the better option. For the purpose of our secondary analysis and following these findings we assume that parental homeownership has a significant effect on leaving home. In line with the existing research evidence regarding parental non-transferable resources we also expect these transferable resources to have a stronger influence on young women. Furthermore, housing is cheaper outside cities in Slovenia and properties are larger and can often be transformed into two separate household units (Mandi c & Gnidovec, 1999). Therefore, we expect it will be easier in smaller towns and villages to leave the parental household, even though the geographical distance to parents will actually remain small. On the basis of the data available for our analysis (see below) we cannot further differentiate the actual reasons for moving out. Likewise, we do not have the possibility to test the impact of factors such as the quality of relationship between parents and family structure which have been often examined as possible determinants of co-residence with parents and home leaving but with mixed and inconsistent findings (Kins, Beyers, Soenens, & Vansteenkiste, 2009). Summary of hypotheses. In terms of hypotheses for our analysis regarding the first cluster of key factors influencing moving out we expect young women to leave their parental home at an earlier age than young men (H1a). The availability of a job and of independent income should facilitate moving out (H1b). We expect completed higher levels of education to accelerate moving out; although women tend to spend more time in education their chances are not necessarily better due to their fields of study (H1c). Although living together with a partner is often combined with living inside the parental household, we expect it to be an important marker and step towards independence (H1d). We hypothesize that the non-transferable resource of positive relations to parents contributes to delaying leaving home (H2a) while more restrictive parenting has the opposite effect (H2b). These two effects should be more pronounced among young women (H2c). The formulation of hypotheses with regard to the third factor of transferable resources of the family is less clear. We expect the material status of the family to be a significant predictor but the literature is ambiguous about the direction of the influence (H3a). Similarly, parental homeownership is expected to have a significant influence; yet it can both facilitate and hamper residential independence (H3b). We expect a stronger negative effect of parental transferable resources on leaving home for women than for men (H3c). Finally, we expect leaving the parental home to be easier in smaller communities because properties are larger and can be divided into separate households and also the housing prices are lower (H3d). Data and method In order to explore the relevance of these aspects for Slovenia we use the Youth 2010 survey (Lavri c et al., 2010a), which targeted the population of young people between the age of 15 and 29 years residing in Slovenia on the 26th of July 2010. The survey was conducted by Lavric et al. (2010a) and is publicly accessible for secondary analysis. It was funded by the Office for Youth of the Republic of Slovenia after a ten-year break in nationally representative and comprehensive empirical research on young people. In conceptual and methodological terms it continues with the tradition of Slovenian youth research since 1985. In its design and methodological approach the survey followed the German youth studies conducted by Hurrelmann, Albert and Infratest (2002, 2006). It covered a broad range of themes with an emphasis on Slovenian youth policy priorities including education, employment, housing conditions, participation and social inclusion, voluntary activity, health and

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well-being, culture and leisure. The design of the measures used in the survey does not indicate explicit cross-references to standardized psychological scales but they are oriented towards internationally recognized youth research.

Sample The sample was stratified according to regions and municipalities following the Central Population Register of Slovenia. The face-to-face interviews were conducted between July and September 2010 at the respondents' private homes. Altogether 1.257 young people between 15 and 29 years were interviewed by trained interviewers after having been informed about the survey and invited to participate in writing beforehand. The response rate was 62.9 percent. The original sample consisted of 910 emerging adults between 19 and 29 years. For our purposes we excluded young people who still attend school education regularly as it is very uncommon for them to have moved out of the parental home, i.e. only 10.9% (n ¼ 49) of 19e29-olders who are in education do not live at home anymore. Similarly, young people below the age of 19 were not included because almost all of them (96.3%) still attend education regularly and live with their parents. Our analysis finally focuses on a subsample of 462 young people between 19 and 29 years who are no longer in education. Of these, 32.1% (n ¼ 143) no longer live in the household of their parents1; yet even among this group 11.2% (n ¼ 16) occasionally still stay overnight at their parents' place. Moving out is not necessarily a one-way road or an irreversible act; it can be a complex and longer-term process (Seiffge-Krenke, 2009; 2010). Further research is necessary to study this particular phenomenon in Slovenia.

Variables and measures The total sample of 462 young people consists of 46.2% young women, the average age of respondents is 25.8 years (SD 2.8). At the time of the interview 6.4% have completed (only) elementary education, 63.2% secondary education and 30.4% higher education. 82.4% are involved in some kind of gainful employment (including part-time and temporary work), 17.6% do not work at all. 16.0% of the respondents do not report any monthly income; for those who do the mean income is 829.2 EUR (SD 478.0 EUR). 10.8% are married, 34.1% cohabiting with their partner, 27.0% are living apart together with a partner and 28.1% are single. 18.8% of the respondents already have their own child/-ren. 31.4% spent the majority of their life in a place with less than 10.000 inhabitants and 68.6% in a place with more than 10.000 inhabitants. 81.0% of the respondents assess their family's material status as average, 12.2% below and 6.8% as above average. 26.1% of the respondents indicated that the highest level of education that one of their parents completed did not go beyond elementary education, for 58.0% it is secondary education and for 15.9% higher education. 69.6% of the respondents indicated that their parents live in their own house, 18.0% that they live in their own flat, and 6.9% of parents rent their accommodation. Apart from these socio-demographic variables our analysis includes measures regarding the self-assessed perception of the relationship quality with parents an the parenting style. The relationship quality is measured on the basis of six items on a five point scale (from totally agree to totally disagree) used by Lavri c et al. (2010a): (1) “My parents love me very much”; (2) “I'm getting along well with my mother”; (3) “I'm getting along well with my father”; (4) “My mother and I are closer than most children of my age and their mothers”; (5)“My father and I are closer than most children of my age and their fathers”; (6) “I don't feel (did not feel) well at home” (reverse scored). Principal component factor analysis indicates that these items converge on only one factor with an explained variance of 44.70 percent. The inner consistency of the measure is confirmed by a Cronbach's Alpha of .74. The total scale score (mean of the items) is 3.36 (with SD .57). Parenting styles are measured by eight items that Lavri c et al. (2010a) formulated following Baumrind's (1967) basic typology of authoritative, permissive, and authoritarian parenting styles: (1) “I was allowed to participate in the setting of rules in my family”; (2) “Parents usually explained why I should follow a certain rule”; (3) “I often got desired things (toys, sweets etc.) just to be good”; (4) “At least one parent often gave in, if I strongly resisted or demanded something”; (5) “At least one parent often shouted at me”; (6) “If my behavior did not correspond to parental expectations I was often scolded”; (7) “If my behavior was not appropriate I often got a slap in the face or other physical punishment”; (8) “At least one parent often threatened me with sanctions”. Principal component factor analysis identifies two factors at the background of these eight items with an explained variance of 55.75%. Items 1 to 4 measuring authoritative and permissive parenting styles are attributed to one single factor with moderately strong loadings; we call it participatory permissive parenting style. The remaining four items converge with very strong loadings to another factor that we call repressive parenting style. The two factors are statistically significant and negatively correlated (r ¼ .23). The total score for the participatory permissive parenting style is 3.4 (SD .56; Cronbach's Alpha: .49) and for the repressive parenting style 2.3 (SD .78; Cronbach's Alpha: .77). We can use only the later in the following analysis. Repressive parenting is statistically significantly negatively correlated with

1 The sample includes young people that, during the week, live in student apartments and return to the parental home every weekend. We follow Kins et al. (2009) here and their studies about Belgian students where they treat this category of semi-autonomous college students like those living at home. Since Slovenia is a small country with few universities and short distances, more than 60% of students live at the parental home during their studies (Ule, Tivadar, Kurdija, & Rajsp, 2008).

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the perceived quality of the parentechild relationship (r ¼ .36); it is the other way round for participatory permissive parenting (r ¼ .38). Results The analysis is done in two steps. First we explore the relationship between each independent variable and our binary dependent variable of living in the parental household or not (Table 2). In a second step, in order to identify the effects of each independent variable, we calculate a binary logistic regression model where we include all independent variables simultaneously (Table 3). Descriptive results The descriptive analysis with regard to leaving the household or not indicates statistically significant differences for the following variables: gender, age, monthly income, partnership status, being a parent, (p < .01), young person's completed education, repressive parenting style, parental housing status, and size of place where majority of life was spent (p < .05). The young person's employment status, perception of quality of relationship with parents, family's material status and parental completed education do not show statistically significant differences p  .05). The share of women still living in the parental home is almost 20 percentage points lower than the share of men, which corroborates findings about gendered ways of leaving home. Unsurprisingly, the average age of those living with parents is significantly lower. Young people in tertiary education are the least likely to still live at home. Among those who live at home the average monthly income is about 250 V lower. In the sample, more than half of young people cohabiting with a partner and almost 80% of those who are married do no longer live in the parental home. Also being a young father or mother considerably decreases the likelihood of living with one's own parents; however, more than one third of young parents still do. Table 2 Variable living/not living with parents cross-tabulated by selected variables. Living in parental household?

Yes n

Gender Women Men Age Completed education Primary Secondary Tertiary Employment status Has a job Unemployed Average monthly income Partnership status Married Cohabitation with a partner Has a partner, but they live separately Single Parenthood Has children Does not have children Perception of quality of Relationship with parents Repressive parenting style Family's material status Above average Average Under average Parental completed education Primary Secondary Tertiary Parental housing status Owning a house Owning a flat Renters Size of place where majority of life was spent Less than 10.000 inhabitants More than 10.000 inhabitants Note. *p < .05, **p < .01.

c2 value or F

No % or mean

n

% or mean

118 188 306

55.9 76.4 25.4

93 58 151

44.1 23.6 26.7

21.57**

18 205 83

62.1 71.2 59.7

11 83 56

37.9 28.8 40.3

5.94*

249 57 255

66.4 71.3 742.1

126 23 128

33.6 28.7 1010.0

10 70 117 115

20.4 45.2 87.0 91.4

39 85 16 11

79.6 54.8 13.0 8.6

30 273 306 304

35.3 60.3 3.35 2.19

55 95 142 145

64.7 39.7 3.38 2.32

20 254 31

64.5 69.2 56.4

11 113 24

35.5 30.8 43.6

5.94

69 184 43

60.0 72.2 61.4

46 71 27

40.0 27.8 38.6

6.61*

222 46 15

70.9 56.8 48.4

91 35 16

29.1 43.2 51.6

18.01**

222 84

70.9 58.7

91 59

29.1 41.3

6.60**

20.77**

4.53 14.56** 137.86**

47.15**

.11 2.10*

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Table 3 Results of binary logistic regression: significance and regression coefficients for the dependent variable living/not living in the household of parents. B Gender Transition to adulthood indicators Completed education Employment status Average monthly income Partnership status Parents-young person relationship indicators Perception of quality of Relationship with parents Repressive parenting style Family's socio-economic background Family's material status Parental education Parental housing status Size of place where majority of life was spent

S.E.

Sig.

.85

.33

.01

Exp (B) .43

.33 .19 .20 2.79

.29 .51 .17 .35

.26 .71 .00 .00

1.39 1.21 1.24 .06

.03 .16

.30 .23

.93 .04

.98 .94

.08 .45 .45 1.02

.46 .25 .50 .35

.86 .07 .04 .03

.92 .64 1.57 .36

The majority of young adults feel good at home and that their relationship with both parents is positive and close; the comparison of average values of the items measuring the perception of the quality of the relationship with parents does not indicate statistically significant differences between children still living with their parents or not. Those young adults that are already moved out assessed the parental parenting style as statistically significantly more repressive than those still living at home. Families owning a house or flat seem to have a higher chance to ‘keep’ young people in comparison to families renting their accommodation. A higher proportion of young people who spent the majority of their life in smaller towns and villages, in comparison to those from places of more than 10.000 inhabitants, are still living with their parents. Results from the logistic regression Before entering the available variables into the logistic regression with living with parents as the dependent variable, we excluded some for reasons of multicollinearity. Age is not included as it is implicit in developmental indicators like education or partnership status. Also parenthood was excluded due to its high correlation with the partnership variable. Furthermore some variables were recoded and dichotomized: employment status into employed or unemployed, and partnership status into living together with a partner or not. Table 3 shows the results of the binary logistic regression with all independent variables entered simultaneously into the model. The predictive quality of the model of selected variables is good and the model proved to be statistically significant (Chi-square ¼ 140.32, p ¼ .00 with df ¼ 11). The Hosmer Lemeshow test for goodness-of-fit is not significant (p ¼ .43) indicating that the model of predicted values does not differ significantly from the observed data. The value of .48 for Nagelkerke's R2 points to a relatively high predictive power of the model. Of the potential predictors of (not) staying with parents, six were shown to be independent predictors: gender (B ¼ .85, p ¼ .01), monthly income (B ¼ .20, p ¼ .00), partnership status (B ¼ 2.79, p ¼ .00), repressive parenting style (B ¼ .16, p ¼ .04), parental homeownership (B ¼ .45, p ¼ .04) and size of long-term place of residence B ¼ 1.02, p ¼ .03). In terms of individual transition indicators, the analysis supports our expectations regarding gender: being female halves the odds of living with parents in comparison with being male. Consistently with the literature and our hypothesis, higher average monthly income does facilitate leaving home. Contrary to our expectations, participation in employment and level of education produce no significant predictions. In line with our expectations, living with a partner greatly reduces the odds of remaining at home. Our hypothesis concerning the relationship between children and parents are confirmed, yet not to the extent that we had expected. The perceived quality of the relationship to parents does not result in a significant prediction, probably because it is high for both stayers and leavers. However, as expected, with regard to our indicator for the parenting style we found that a repressive parenting style increases the odds of leaving by factor .16. With regard to family resources and background, our variable directly measuring the family's transferable resources, i.e. the self-assessed material status of the family, does not indicate a significant influence in any direction; neither does the level of education completed by parents. However, if we except homeownership as a proxy for actual (rather than self-assessed) transferable resources we find that there is a relationship: if parents own the property, compared to renters, young people are more likely to stay. We also find a significant effect in this last set of variables with regard to the place of residence: having spent the majority of one's life in small towns and villages reduces the odds of living with parents. In accordance with our expectation, young people outside bigger towns seem to have a higher probability to leave their parents' home. Finally, the inclusion of interactions in order to analyze the influence of gender on all independent variables does not improve the fit of the model. The change in chi-square (Chi-square ¼ 5.22, p ¼ .88 with df ¼ 10) is not statistically significant therefore we cannot confirm any of our hypotheses regarding gender interactions. Despite the unexpectedly low influence of gender in our model we think that gender remains an important dimension for further analysis.

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Discussion: Slovenia in context Our analysis of young people leaving home in Slovenia brings quite a few new and unexpected insights into the issue of prolonged co-residence of parents and children in Slovenia. First of all, our data support the existing findings about the young women's earlier leaving the parental home, but on the other hand a more sophisticated analysis does not confirm our assumptions based on the research evidence about the differences in the effects of the potential predictors on the timing of leaving the parental home of young men and women. The fact that young women tend to move out earlier seems to underline the persistence of rather traditional norms regarding the distribution of roles between men and women. The socialist doctrine endowed women in Slovenia in the socialist period with a high level of political, social and economic emancipation; but it has not benefitted in the same extent the spheres such as the gender-specific division of labor within the family. In the post-socialist period following its independence Slovenia, unlike some other former socialist countries, has not faced a process of re-traditionalization in the form of the withdrawal of women from the labor market in order to take care of the family. Nevertheless, the division of family labor and parenting involvement are predominantly still gendered (Humer & Kuhar, 2010). The absence of the gendered effects of parental transferable and nontransferable resources seems to suppose that young men and women are treated equally in the parental home, for example that parents are not stricter towards young women or that they would need to do more household chores. The existing research evidence in Slovenia on the one hand shows that the majority of parents are focused on supporting the education process of their children and that they do not have many other expectations or demands; on the other hand both genders enjoy a great level of autonomy and independence in the parental home (Ule, 2012; Ule & Zidar, 2012). It looks that women on average leave the parental home earlier not because they would have a higher education or a (more) stable job but because they step into stable partnership on average earlier than men. This is supported also by our data; significantly more 19e29-old women are already married or live in cohabitations. More research is needed to understand this phenomenon of the female ‘advanced intimate development’ (Seiffge-Krenke, 2013). Somewhat surprisingly, neither the educational level of young people nor their employment participation can significantly predict leaving or staying at the parental home. At the same time, the respondents' income does have significant influence. In combination, this finding may underline evidence that having a job is not a sufficient condition for leaving the parental home, especially not in the Southern European countries (Cordon, 1997; Le Blanc & Wolff, 2006). Further research needs to show whether the gradual decoupling of employment and income is one of the key factors explaining why unemployed and employed young people, and especially young men, delay home leaving. The fact that this phenomenon is associated with the Mediterranean welfare model (Cordon, 1997; Lanz & Tagliabue, 2007) may indicate that these countries are at the forefront of this decoupling. More systematic comparative research of youth employment and unemployment, like for example Cinalli and Giugni (2013), is necessary to fully disentangle the socioeconomic consequences of this development. To what extent do features of precarious work, like low income, penetrate also the sphere of permanent employment of young people? Are permanent jobs really more secure and better paid than fixed-term contracts? And, what are the possibilities for individuals to respond to such changes in the institutional organization of employment and unemployment? The importance of a partnership as a predictor for leaving home underlines the interconnectedness of classical youth transition indicators. Almost all young adults in our sample that have already moved out live with their partner: 25.8% of them are married, 56.3% live in cohabitation with a partner, only 10.6% have a partner but do not live together and 7.3% are single. However, our data that does not include information about when the partnership started and we cannot determine whether living together with a partner actually motivated leaving home. Longitudinal research is necessary to answer questions like these. In any case, our secondary analysis provides no reason to assume that the mere fact of being married or cohabiting with a partner necessarily involves independent housing: 23.0% of those who still live in their parents' household also stated that they live together with a partner. Our data set does not provide any indication for the quality of these relationships in terms of ‘stability’. Furthermore, we have to assume that quite a few of those who already moved out have actually not yet reached full residential emancipation and might instead live within the household of their partner's parents. So far, the various types of cohabitation of young people in Slovenia are largely unexplored. Our findings regarding the importance of partnership suggest that moving out from the parental home in Slovenia is similar to other Mediterranean countries with a strong association between stable romantic relationships and leaving home (Lanz & Tagliabue, 2007). Like Southern European countries (Billari, Philipov, & Baiz an, 2001; Iacovou, 1998, 2002) most countries of the Balkan region are still characterized by a strong link between leaving home and family formation (Kuhar & Reiter, 2010). A recent numerical classification of countries according to family solidarity and family values even directly merges Slovenia with Italy (Calzada & Brooks, 2013, p. 524). This is different in Northern and Western European countries where this link has become somewhat relaxed since the 1970s: young people leave home in order to live independently earlier - already at the time of higher education or at the latest when they are securely employed (or economically independent) (Buchmann & Kriesi, 2011; Goldscheider & Goldscheider, 1993; Iacovou, 2010; Luetzelberger, 2012). However, close links between moving out of the parental home and family formation do not imply that Slovenia, or other countries where this is the case, are unprogressive with regard to family formation patterns. For instance, in Slovenia since the 1960s life courses and family patterns keep pluralizing; birth rates dropped well before the collapse of state socialism; in 2011 67.3% of children were born out of wedlock (Statistical Office of the Republic of Slovenia, 2012), and most of them will remain unmarried due to the equalization of cohabitation and marriage.

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The descriptive findings indicate a surprisingly consistent pattern of parentechild relationship quality among young people both staying and leaving home. Especially in view of the non-significant results this could of course point to a problem of measurement and to the lacking discriminatory power of the related items used in the survey. However, at least if we discard the possibility of strong norms of social desirability with regard to such relationship questions, it could also point to the prevalence of a rather homogenous family culture in Slovenia that is characterized by generally good relationships between parents and children. Against this background it is not surprising that, in case parenting is perceived as repressive young people are more inclined to leave home as a reaction to parents that often shout, scold, threaten with sanctions or use physical sanctions. In fact, these push-effects of repressive parenting that we identify for Slovenia support Seiffge-Kranke’s (2006) finding that conflictual relationships with parents tend to accelerate leaving home. Future research needs to analyze other, potentially more influential relational factors like attachment styles, autonomy enjoyed at home, parental separation anxiety etc. For example, the study of Seiffge-Krenke (2006) shows that secure attachment styles are related to leaving home in time, while insecurity with respect to attachment delays home leaving in young adults. For now, the only (non-representative) Slovenian study on attachment styles among 176 students of the University of Ljubljana with an average age of 22.3 years shows that only 48% of students were securely attached to their  parents, 13% were anxious (or preoccupied), 10% were avoidant (or dismissive-avoidant) and 29% were fearful-avoidant (Zvelc  & Zvelc, 2006). In view of the complexity of relationship issues and the ambiguity of our findings qualitative approaches seem to be better suited to capture the interactional and everyday dynamic of what is actually happening between parents and their children. In this way one could analyze in more depth also the perspective of parents about children staying or leaving, young adults' perceptions on this issue, as well as parental strategies of supporting the autonomy of their children (Kins et al., 2009). Longitudinal research would be necessary to fully understand the interplay of all these aspects over time (Bucx & Van Wel, 2008; Seiffge-Kranke, 2006). Contrary to our expectations the self-assessed material status of the family as an indicator for transferable resources does not prove to be a statistically significant predictor for leaving home. The majority of respondents assessed the family's material status as average. Again, this might be related to social desirability: against the background of the socialist past of Slovenia the persistence of egalitarian societal values may prevent people from reporting a higher and also a lower material status. However, the importance of economic resources is evident from other data from the same survey: only 32.9% of those young people who already moved out also own the dwelling place (alone or together with their partner); in 39.6% of these cases the property owners are the parents of one of the partners; and 26.8% of respondents rent the dwelling. Among those who own a flat or a house, 10.9% reported that they funded it mostly by themselves, 30.4% financed it through taking a loan, in 8.7% cases the investment was completely covered by parents, and 50.0% inherited the property (mostly from grandparents). What is more, among respondents who still live in the household of their parents, almost all expect them to help solve problems related to housing; only 9.0% do not expect this kind of support. Among those who already left home, 33.3% already found a solution and no longer expect their parents' support, 27.5% count on some further parental assistance, and 39.1% on extensive future support. At least indirectly, the remaining variables in the regression model corroborate the importance of transferable resources of the family for the children's leaving home. Young adults whose parents rent a property, rather than own it, leave earlier. Since more than 90% of flats and houses are privately owned in Slovenia, renting is a sign of lower economic status. Additional analyses of employment status and parental housing status shows: if parents own a flat, the probability of their children moving out in case they are employed is significantly higher than in case they own a house. Besides, young adults from smaller cities and villages leave earlier than those from cities with over 10.000 inhabitants. This is not only connected with cheaper housing prices in smaller places but also with two-household houses and possibility for new houses on the same plot. In the end, the interrelation of housing and employment appears to be an extremely complex issue that deserves further attention as it is certainly one of the key aspects of residential emancipation in Slovenia. Like for every secondary analysis of data that were collected for a different purpose some reservations are necessary regarding the limitations of our analysis. First of all, as already mentioned, we found no indication that the measures used in the survey refer directly to standard scales established in this field of psychological research. Thus, direct comparison is not possible. Then, on the basis of this survey we cannot find out whether respondents that have a partner and already left home now live in the household of the partner's parents or not. In other words, we cannot be sure about the actual level of residential emancipation: after all, as many as 22.0% of those still living in the parents' household stated that they (also) live together with a partner. Furthermore, the survey does not allow us to find out whether respondents with own households established them within the parental premises, or have the option to do so. According to the Slovenian census of 2011, some 30% of the houses accommodate more than one household. Finally, for those who already left home we have no information about the type of family or the number of siblings. We only know that among those still living with their parents, 96.4% live with their mother and 87.0% with their father. In post-socialist countries extended cohabitation with parents is often interpreted as one aspect of the growing importance of primary relationships and networks for surviving the (economic) uncertainty of the transitional period (e.g., Kovacheva, 2006; Tomanovi c, 2002). Recent European comparative research confirms that prolonged coresidence of parents and children is a common response to economic insecurities (Isengard & Szydlick, 2012). In the case of Slovenia this feature of post-socialist societies is reinforced by the generally strong family-based sense of solidarity that, for instance, Reher (1998)

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associates with Mediterranean countries. In this sense further research could try to find out whether growing up in a Mediterranean and post-socialist country like Slovenia is generally embedded within a comprehensive “culture of postponement” that Reiter (2009) suggests with regard to the transition to motherhood in post-state socialism. In any case, the prolonged dependence of young adults on their family of origin, especially the prolonged co-residence, can have ambiguous consequences. While providing a nest for young people to carefully find their path into the reality of a new market society that is deeply affected by the ongoing economic crisis, overprotective parenting can probably also do considerable harm by literally immobilize the offspring. However, we need to postpone the evaluation of this phenomenon and consider its embeddedness within the socioeconomic context. 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