Leaving the Parental Home in Poland

Kamil Sienkiewicz, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research

This study describes trends in the process of leaving the parental home in Poland. Because of dramatic changes in Polish society after the breakdown of the Communist regime, a significant alteration of the determinants of leaving home is hypothesized. This is examined with data from the Polish retrospective survey, which was carried out in 2001. With the help of piecewise linear event history regressions the explanatory significance of demographic (number of siblings), social (composition of household), and economic (occupational status of parents, region of residence, educational level of respondents) factors on the timing of leaving home is investigated. First results show that leaving home before 1989 was highly dependent on marital formation and education enrollment. In general, young people left their home in order to set up new households. Further, more detailed analyzes (competing risk models) will examine whether this pattern remains stable or whether other factors became influential.