Lifting The Stigma On Adults Who Still Live At Home With Their Parents

Researchers have tried to debunk the stereotype of overgrown “kidults” (kid-adults) living at home with their parents, insisting that there’s more to the picture than just laziness.

Edgar Liu, a research fellow at the University of New South Wales, suggests that there is a narrow portrayal of what modern-day multigenerational households look like.

He writes, “Names like ‘mummy’s boys’… [and] ‘gen why bother moving out’ are used to describe this supposedly dependent generation who won’t leave the comfort of the family home."

Together with a team of researchers, Liu says their findings indicate there are several different factors driving families towards living together under one roof. “With around one in five Australians living in multigenerational households since at least the mid-1980s, it’s about time we moved beyond the stereotypes,” he writes.

Research cites financial constraints as the biggest reason why adults are choosing to stay at home. I mean, given the exorbitant rental prices in places like Sydney and Melbourne, this should come as no surprise.

Here's the graph from the report:

Staying at home well into adulthood is commonplace in other parts of the world, including Asia, the Middle East and Southern Europe. Liu identifies cultural reasons as a valid factor for people choosing to stay at home.

While there are certainly positives to staying at home (such as not having to pay rent, or paying little rent, and fewer chores) there are common things that people dislike about multigenerational living.

Researchers Lyn Craig and Abigail Powell found that “privacy and interference” was the most regularly cited annoyance of living at home, for kidults.

So yeah, next time you might be tempted to roast someone for living at home with their parents and being a proper adult, maybe think twice?

Photo: Sony and Living Together: The Rise Of Multigenerational Households in Australian Cities (Report)