Linda Young-DeMarco

A Portrait of the Nest-leaving Process in Early Adulthood*

This paper provides an in-depth portrait of the nest-leaving process in early adulthood as it emerged in the 1980s. Event histories are used to describe transitions in and out of the parental home during the years from age 15 through age 23. We focus on the role of the “new” forms of living arrangements in the leaving-home process, namely nonfamily living and cohabitation. The results show that the transition to full residential independence is more gradual, with more intermediate steps, than previous studies suggested. Cohabitation is rare as a route out of the parental home, and both nonfamily living and cohabitation lead to much higher return rates than does marriage.

Leaving the Parental Nest: The Experience of a Young White Cohort in the 1980s.

The purpose of this article is to provide a dynamic view of living arrangements and the process of becoming residentially independent of parents during the transition to adulthood as it was experienced [in the United States] during the 1980s. This research utilizes retrospective information on living arrangements obtained from a sample of a birth cohort of men and women aged 23 in 1985. Event histories from these young people are used to describe their living arrangements during the years from age 15 through age 23 ages during which 87% left the parental home at least once. Included in this analysis are descriptions of the household living arrangements young people experience during these important maturational years. Also included are estimates of the rates of making transitions in living arrangements and the percentages of men and women who have ever experienced specific types of household living arrangements. (EXCERPT)

Migrant Values and Beliefs: How Are They Different and How Do They Change?

This is a study of the values of migrants. We examine processes of selection—how values affect migration—and adaptation—how migration influences value changes. Empirical analyses use a unique collection of data that combines detailed information on values from a representative sample of non-migrants in Nepal with a representative sample of Nepali migrants living in the Persian Gulf. Results suggest that migrants were selected from those who were more materialistic, less committed to religion and more family-oriented. In terms of adaptation, our results are consistent with the idea that migrants become more religious, less committed to historical Nepali values, and change ideas about family-orientation in mixed ways. Thus, we find that value adaptations of migrants are complex processes that could have immense impacts on ideational diffusion around the world.

The perception of global hierarchies: South-Eastern European patterns in comparative perspectives

In this paper we examine the views of ordinary people in Hungary and Romania about developmental trajectories and developmental hierarchies. Our work extends research on perception of global hierarchies as we include the views of ordinary people in the countries of Hungary and Romania. In addition, our research makes a unique contribution to the development and developmental hierarchy literature by examining, for the first time, how individuals define development. Although the main focus of this paper is the developmental views of Hungarians and Romanians, at times we add to our discussion results from a survey in Bulgaria and another from Albania. In this paper we conclude that developmental models are widespread among ordinary people in Hungary and Romania; we also find that the South-East European region does show some specificities in terms of the over- and under-positioning of certain countries relative to the dominant international rating system. China and, to a lesser degree, Russia were over-positioned by respondents relative to the developmental index scores of those countries. Within the region, unlike Bulgarians and Albanians, who severely underrated themselves, Hungarian and Romanian respondents put themselves in a middle position on the developmental scale. Concerning developmental items with some differences between the two countries, our data show that the economy is the most important development criterion in the minds of Hungarians and Romanians, followed by democracy, science and technology, and education.

Strategies for origin-based surveying of international migrants

ABSTRACT This paper addresses methodological challenges of investigations of international migration, including difficulties in obtaining information about representative samples of migrants and both their origin and destination location. Our project used an origin-based sample with a destination-focused survey and interviewed 91% of migrants from a community in Nepal to any destination and shares techniques employed. Our procedures and high response rate constitute a significant improvement in survey methods that permit the creation of unbiased data on migrants and allow the study of migration in conjunction with origin communities.

Evaluating the measurement reliabilities and dimensionality of developmental idealism measures

This paper investigates the measurement of developmental idealism. Developmental idealism is a set of beliefs and values stating that modern societies and families are better than traditional societies and families, that modern families facilitate modern societies, and that modern societies foster modern families. Prior research has shown that developmental idealism is widespread globally but has provided little evidence about whether beliefs concerning developmental idealism can be measured reliably at the individual level. It also has provided little information about the dimensionality and psychometric properties of measures of developmental idealism. Using cross-sectional survey data from Argentina, China, and Egypt, we explore and test the factor structure underlying observed measures for aspects of developmental idealism and estimate the reliability of different models. Theory and data suggest that developmental idealism consists of multiple dimensions, and when family-related items are measuring similar underlying constructs, the measurement reliabilities are high. These results provide evidence that the dimensions of developmental idealism can be measured with a high degree of reliability.