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Coming Home After Living Abroad: What the Research Actually Shows
Coming home is supposed to be the easy part, which is why a hard return can feel so confusing. Research on re-entry suggests the difficulty is less about home itself and more about what you expected it to be. A longitudinal study of 1,319 returnees found that, overall, they adapted better than they had anticipated, but where the experience fell short of their expectations, well-being was lower. A second study of students sent home early during the COVID-19 pandemic found that re-entry stressors predicted higher stress and loneliness. We could not find a study that tested journaling or voice recording for people returning home, so this page sticks to what the research does show.
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What a study of 1,319 returnees found
In a 2022 paper in Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being, Nicolas Geeraert, Colleen Ward and Paul H. P. Hanel followed 1,319 sojourners returning home, with a mean age of about 17 and 70% female. They measured what people expected before coming back, then measured their experience and well-being about two weeks and about six months after return. Overall, returnees reported higher levels of re-entry adaptation than they had anticipated.
When home falls short of what you pictured
The same study looked at what happened when expectations and experience did not match. When re-entry was harder than expected, larger gaps were associated with lower well-being. When adaptation was better than expected, well-being was higher. When expectations and experience matched, there was no link with well-being either way. The authors describe this as support for a directional effect: it was specifically undermet expectations that went with lower well-being.
When the return is not your choice
A 2021 study in the International Journal of Intercultural Relations, by A. Fanari and C. Segrin, followed 133 U.S. college students who were forced to return early from study abroad during the COVID-19 pandemic. Students completed questionnaires at their return and again about six months later. Re-entry related stressors predicted higher perceived stress and loneliness. The authors concluded that the students who had the hardest time returning home unexpectedly were at the highest risk for worsened mental health.
What this does not show
Both studies looked at young people: returnees with a mean age of about 17, and college students. We cannot say from them how adults coming home after years of working abroad fare. The pandemic study looked at an unusual, unplanned return. Both are observational, so they describe patterns rather than causes. We read both through their indexed summaries, not the full papers, so we have left out effect sizes we could not see. We could not find a study that tested journaling or voice recording for people returning home.
What that means if you want to try it
If the research is right that the gap between expectation and reality is what weighs on people, it may help to name both sides: what you pictured coming back to, and what you actually found, including how you have changed. Phi's 60-second voice entries are one place to say that out loud. That is a format, not a tested treatment: neither study above tested voice journaling.
Sources
Geeraert, N., Ward, C., & Hanel, P. H. P. (2022). Returning home: The role of expectations in re-entry adaptation. Applied Psychology: Health and Well-Being, 14(3), 949–966.Fanari, A., & Segrin, C. (2021). Longitudinal effects of U.S. students' reentry shock on psychological health after returning home during the COVID-19 global pandemic. International Journal of Intercultural Relations.Say it out loud instead.
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