Coinciding with the global economic crisis, the age at first marriage in Korea has been delayed. Traditionally, the independence of adult children away from parents has been expectable mainly when they get married, thus, it would mean that for the elderly parents to live with their adult children will also be anticipated to extend. This study aims to investigate whether co-residence between adult children and older parents disrupts the quality of marital relationships for elderly parents in Korea. Using quota sampling in terms of living arrangements (living together vs. living apart), 500 elderly parents, having at least one unmarried child aged 35 years old or above, were selected in Seoul, Korea in June 2016. The quality of marital relationships as a dependent variable was measured with four concepts: marital satisfaction, marital intimacy, marital consensus, and marital conflict. Co-residence of parents with adult children as an independent variable was measured with a binary variable. Regular financial support for adult children and socio-demographic variables were controlled. Findings from a series of OLS regression models and the ordered logit model show that parents living with adult children were less likely to report satisfaction, intimacy, and consensus in their marital relationships than those who living apart from their adult children, holding financial dependency of the child fixed. However, co-residence with unmarried adult children was not positively associated with marital conflicts between the elderly couples. The present study has implications for the marital relationships of elderly Korean couples by boomerang and/or failure-to-launch families.
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