Abstract
Residential mobility is one documented stressor contributing to higher delinquency and worse educational outcomes. Sensitive period life course models suggest that certain developmental stages make individuals more susceptible to the effects of an exposure, like residential mobility, on outcomes. However, most prior research is observational, and has not examined heterogeneity across age or gender that may inform sensitive periods, even though it may have important implications for the etiology of adolescent development. Moreover, there are important translational implications for identifying the groups most vulnerable to residential mobility to inform how to buffer adverse effects of moving. In this study, low-income families were randomized to residential mobility out of public housing into lower poverty neighborhoods using a rental subsidy voucher (“experimental voucher condition”), and were compared to control families remaining in public housing. The sample was comprised of 2829 youth (51% female; 62% Non-Hispanic Black, 31% Hispanic, 7% other race). At baseline, youth ranged from 5 to 16 years old. This study hypothesized that random assignment to the housing voucher condition would generate harmful effects on delinquency and educational problems, compared to the control group, among boys who were older at baseline. The results confirmed this hypothesis: random assignment to the experimental voucher condition generating residential mobility caused higher delinquency among boys who were 13–16 years old at baseline, compared to same-age, in-place public housing controls. However, residential mobility did not affect delinquency among girls regardless of age, or among boys who were 5–12 years old at baseline. The pattern of results for educational problems was similar but weaker. Families with teenage boys are particularly vulnerable to residential transitions. Incorporating additional supports into housing programs may help low-income, urban families to successfully transition to lower poverty neighborhoods.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 2009-2026 |
| Number of pages | 18 |
| Journal | Journal of Youth and Adolescence |
| Volume | 47 |
| Issue number | 10 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Oct 1 2018 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:Funding This work was supported by National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant 1R03HD082679 (Dr. Schmidt, PI).
Funding Information:
Acknowledgements This work was supported by National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant 1R03HD082679 (Dr. Schmidt, PI). The authors gratefully acknowledge support from the Minnesota Population Center (P2C HD041023) funded through a grant from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute for Child Health and Human Development (NICHD). Funders did not have any role in design or conduct of the study; collection, management, analysis, and interpretation of the data; or preparation, review, or approval of the manuscript. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) had no role in the analysis or the preparation of this manuscript. HUD reviewed the manuscript to ensure respondent confidentiality was maintained in the presentation of results.
Funding Information:
This work was supported by National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant 1R03HD082679 (Dr. Schmidt, PI). The authors gratefully acknowledge support from the Minnesota Population Center (P2C HD041023) funded through a grant from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute for Child Health and Human Development (NICHD). Funders did not have any role in design or conduct of the study; collection, management, analysis, and interpretation of the data; or preparation, review, or approval of the manuscript. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) had no role in the analysis or the preparation of this manuscript. HUD reviewed the manuscript to ensure respondent confidentiality was maintained in the presentation of results. NS conceptualized and designed the study, executed all analyses, and drafted the manuscript. MK drafted the manuscript and advised on the outcomes and the interpretation of findings. TO helped conceptualize and design the study, drafted the manuscript, and advised on the interpretation of findings. All authors have approved the final manuscript as submitted. This work was supported by National Institutes of Health (NIH) grant 1R03HD082679 (Dr. Schmidt, PI). The data set used in this manuscript was obtained under license from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development. These data are not publicly available, and restrictions apply to the availability of these data. Information on how to request the MTO restricted access data may be obtained by contacting the Office of Policy Development and Research: https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/mto.html. The authors declare that they have no conflict of interests.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2018, Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature.
