Parent-Child Relationships at the Transition to Adulthood: A Comparison of Immigrant and Native-Born Youth

Jessica H. Hardie, Pennsylvania State University

Establishing an independent household is an important part of becoming an adult in the United States. Immigrant families may differ from families of the native-born because of norms about intergenerational obligations, the quality of family relationships, and differences in the economic opportunities of immigrant and native-born youth. This paper investigates the determinants of young adults’ co-residence with parents, and among those living apart, proximity to parents, frequency of contact, and economic transfers for first-generation, second-generation, and third-and-above generation youths. We use data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 to take account of parents’ economic resources, family composition, and parent-child relationship quality in adolescence on the transition to independent residence and intergenerational relationships in early adulthood. We find that first and second generation immigrant youth are more likely to live with parents than youth from nonimmigrant families, even after economic and family structure differences are taken into account.