Increasingly, young people spend some period of time away from their parental homes and a family-oriented life style while they are single. Such premarital residential independence diminishes traditional family orientations, delays marriage, and weakens parental influence over children entering adulthood. It may contribute to generational change among ethnic subcommunities. In 1985, we initiated a large-scale inquiry into premarital residential independence. We now present a modified and somewhat expanded analysis plan that pursues several promising new avenues of inquiry that emerged unexpectedly over the course of our first 18 months of research. Our principal data source is High School and Beyond, a nationally representative sample of 53,000 high school seniors in 1980/82 followed longitudinally through their early adult years. We also draw on comparable data for an earlier (1972) cohort. Our proposed further research will (1) provide a basis for assessing continued ethnic distinctiveness in the demography of families, and (2) furnish insights into future directions of family change. By examining both actual behavior and also the prior expectations that parents and children hold about such behavior, our study can cast new light on a fundamental but little understood area of social demography.
