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Moving Back In With Your Parents: What the Research Actually Shows
Moving back into your parents' home can feel like going backwards, partly because living on your own is widely treated as a marker of having made it as an adult. The research does not give one simple answer. In a US study, young adults who returned home after living independently reported more depressive symptoms than peers who stayed independent. But in a UK study that followed 9,714 young adults over eleven survey waves, returning home was not linked to worse mental health, and was associated with a slight reduction in depressive symptoms.
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Why it can feel like failing
In their 2023 paper, Wu and Grundy describe attaining and keeping residential independence as an important marker of a young person's successful transition to adulthood in the UK and many other Western countries. They also note the reasons people return: insecure work, a relationship breaking down, or housing that is hard to afford. So the sense of going backwards is not just in your head. It reflects a widely shared idea of what adulthood is supposed to look like.
What a US study found
In a 2018 study in Society and Mental Health, Caputo used survey data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health) to look at moves in and out of the parental home during young adulthood. Young adults who returned to a parental home after a period of living independently reported an increase in depressive symptoms relative to peers who stayed independent. That held even after accounting for other changes linked to mental health that predict these moves, and for how people rated their relationships with their parents.
What a UK study of 9,714 young adults found
Wu and Grundy used 11 waves (2009 to 2020) of the UK Household Longitudinal Study, focusing on 9,714 adults aged 21 to 35. Over that period, 15% moved back to the parental home at least once. Using fixed-effects models, which compare people with their own earlier selves, they found that returning home was associated with a small improvement on the General Health Questionnaire, and no change on a second mental health measure. The effect did not differ by gender, employment, partnership status or having a child living with them. The authors suggest that the benefits of parental support may outweigh the possible downsides of not living independently.
What about the parents?
A separate 2018 study in Social Science & Medicine by Tosi and Grundy looked at parents aged 50 to 75 across Europe. A child moving back was associated with a decrease in parents' quality of life, mostly when the child returned to an otherwise empty nest, and mostly in Nordic countries. A returning child's unemployment was linked to lower parental quality of life, and a returning child's new partnership to higher.
What this does not show
These studies point in different directions, and they come from different countries, years and measures, so neither settles the question. All are observational: they show associations, not proof that moving home causes better or worse mental health. The UK authors themselves say research in other settings is needed. We could not find a study testing journaling, writing or voice recording for people who have moved back in with their parents. We read the papers through their indexed summaries, not the full texts, so we have left out details we could not see.
What that means if you want to try it
If moving back feels like failing, it may help to separate the move from the story you are telling about it. The UK findings suggest the support that comes with home can matter. Naming what home is giving you right now, alongside what is hard about it, keeps both in view. Phi's 60-second voice entries are one place to say it out loud. That is a format, not a tested treatment: none of the studies above tested voice journaling.
Sources
Caputo, J. (2018). Parental coresidence, young adult role, economic, and health changes, and psychological well-being. Society and Mental Health.Wu, J., & Grundy, E. (2023). 'Boomerang' moves and young adults' mental well-being in the United Kingdom. Advances in Life Course Research, 56, 100531.Tosi, M., & Grundy, E. (2018). Returns home by children and changes in parents' well-being in Europe. Social Science & Medicine.Say it out loud instead.
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