Changes to family structure, household composition and address among young New Zealanders: an update

Figures & data

Figure 1. Time (in months) spent living with biological parents for the whole sample.

Table 1. Care arrangements by year.

	Category 1: two-parent household		Category 2: shared care		Category 3: primary care		Category 4: sole parent care		Category 5: no parental care		Category 6: changing care
At age	n	%	n	%	n	%	n	%	n	%	n	%
1	489	79.90	0	0	7	1.14	62	10.13	0	0	54	8.82
2	468	76.47	2	0.33	18	2.94	74	12.09	0	0	50	8.17
3	442	72.22	5	0.82	29	4.74	97	15.85	2	0.33	37	6.05
4	415	67.81	13	2.12	43	7.03	104	16.99	5	0.82	32	5.23
5	402	65.69	18	2.94	48	7.84	111	18.14	4	0.65	29	4.74
6	377	61.60	20	3.27	67	10.95	112	18.30	2	0.33	34	5.56
7	365	59.64	29	4.74	75	12.25	113	18.46	3	0.49	27	4.41
8	356	58.17	32	5.23	87	14.22	109	17.81	5	0.82	23	3.76
9	343	56.05	36	5.88	89	14.54	116	18.95	6	0.98	22	3.59
10	330	53.92	41	6.70	93	15.20	123	20.10	5	0.82	20	3.27
11	318	51.96	40	6.54	98	16.01	127	20.75	7	1.14	22	3.59
12	307	50.16	51	8.33	96	15.69	130	21.24	7	1.14	21	3.43
13	297	48.53	50	8.17	99	16.18	126	20.59	10	1.63	30	4.90
14	290	47.39	52	8.50	93	10.15	128	20.92	10	1.63	39	6.37
15	288	47.06	50	8.17	88	14.38	131	21.44	16	2.61	39	6.37

Table 2. Stability of care from one 12-month period to the next for 612 young people.

	People born to younger mothers (n = 306)		People born to older mothers (n = 306)		Whole sample (N = 612)
	In stable care (was in current category in previous year)		In stable care (was in current category in previous year)		In stable care (was in current category in previous year)
Age	n	%	n	%	N	%
Birth–1 year	n/a		n/a		n/a
1–2 years	242	79.08	275	89.78	517	84.34
2–3 years	240	78.43	281	91.83	521	84.99
3–4 years	250	81.70	280	91.50	530	86.46
4–5 years	269	87.91	273	89.22	542	88.42
5–6 years	271	88.56	272	88.89	543	88.58
6–7 years	262	85.62	276	90.20	538	87.77
7–8 years	280	91.50	286	91.50	566	92.33
8–9 years	275	89.87	291	95.10	566	92.33
9–10 years	278	90.85	285	93.14	563	91.84
10–11 years	274	89.54	282	92.16	556	90.70
11–12 years	262	85.62	288	94.12	550	89.72
12–13 years	266	86.93	285	93.14	551	89.89
13–14 years	256	83.66	281	91.83	537	87.60
14–15 years	253	82.68	282	92.16	535	87.28
Sustained stable care^a
Birth–5	174	56.86	236	77.12	410	66.99
5–10 years	209	68.30	230	75.16	439	71.73
10–15 years	185	60.46	240	78.43	425	69.44
Birth–15 years	95	31.05	169	55.23	264	43.14

^a Sustained stable care refers to remaining in the same care category for the entire time span indicated (so in the case of the Birth to 15 years period, 180 months).

Table 3. Frequency of change to care arrangement for 612 young people.

Number of year by year changes to care arrangement^a	People born to younger mums (n = 306)	%	People born to older mums (n = 306)	%	Whole sample (n = 612)	%
0	95	31.04	169	55.22	264	43.14
1	53	17.32	33	10.78	86	14.05
2	60	19.60	54	17.65	114	18.63
3	34	11.11	18	5.88	52	8.50
4	30	9.80	16	5.23	46	7.52
5	12	3.92	11	3.59	23	3.76
6	11	3.59	3	0.98	14	2.29
7	7	2.28	1	0.33	8	1.31
8 or more	4	1.31	1	0.33	5	0.82

^a This only includes changes from one year to the next. Changes within a year are not included.

Table 4. Relationship of 4855 cohabitants to the participants.

		Months sharing a house
			Range
Relationship Type	n	Median	Lowest	Highest
Biological mother	612	180	15	180
Biological father^a	575	180	1	180
Step-mother	207	36	1	156
Step-father	309	57	1	180
Foster mother	13	9	1	99
Foster father	11	9	1	99
Adoptive parents	5	155	154	174
Biological sibling	744	156	3	180
Half-sibling	407	84	1	180
Step-sibling	267	34	1	156
Foster sibling	38	12	1	72
Whāngai siblings^b	4	30.5	10	35
Grandmother	280	10	1	180
Grandfather	206	7	1	180
Aunt	118	12	1	179
Uncle	144	10.5	1	164
Cousin	130	6	1	179
Other relative	109	6	1	180
Flatmate/housemate	235	12	1	102
Boarder	115	6	1	72
Friend	161	6	1	106
Other non-relative (e.g. friend’s child)	195	6	1	179

^a Note that 37 biological fathers have never lived with their children. If these fathers are added to the 575 fathers who have spent some time living with their children, then the median number of months fathers spend with some residential care of their children is 180, with a range of 0–180 months.

^b Extended family care arrangement.

Figure 2. Frequency of the different people living with the participant in 180 months (where ‘count’ on the y axis refers to the number of participants with that number of cohabitants who moved in or out) for the whole sample.

Figure 3. Number of locations that young people have lived in by age 15 (where ‘count’ on the y axis refers to the number of participants with who have lived in that number of locations).